There is No Shepard Without Vakarian
by Caboose
Summary: My take on the development of the relationship between Shepard and Garrus over the course of the "Mass Effect" trilogy. Rated M for use of profanity, descriptions of violence, and eventually dark themes. Don't expect quick updates. Crits welcomed.
1. Chapter 1: Farewell

Farewell

_Zakera Ward, One Week after Sovereign's Destruction_

The studio apartment wasn't the one he'd left behind; that one, as well as his storage unit in Tayseri Ward, was buried under one of Sovereign's massive "legs" following the Reaper's destruction by Systems Alliance guns. It was hard to complain too loudly about his circumstances; unlike many he wasn't being forced to cohabitate with as many shellshocked and homeless refugees as possible, which was a good thing. There was barely room enough in this apartment for him, a couch, and a kitchenette.

Garrus hobbled over to the couch that also doubled as his bed and sank into it with a sigh, letting the crutch fall where it would. He leaned over to refold the extra blanket he'd placed on the coffee table, then leaned back and propped his bad foot up on it. His armor had taken the brunt of the impact, but the break had still been a bad one: both metatarsals and his ankle. At least the dislocated shoulder was healing nicely. He winced as he reached over for the bottle of painkillers he'd been given after getting patched up and told to get the hell out; space was among the many resources at a premium in the Citadel's medbays at present.

The persistent dull ache from his broken foot and ankle had been ratcheting up all "afternoon" as his first dose of the day faded. Now that he was back home, it was time to do something about that. He cracked open the bottle and dumped a couple of tablets on the coffee table, then poured himself a glass from the bottle of turian brandy he'd hobbled to his kitchenette to fetch. Garrus popped the pills and knocked back a shot of brandy to wash them down, enjoying the burning sensation as the liquor worked its way down his throat. Closing his eyes, he leaned back on the couch; the pile of datapads with his application to return to C-Sec and the other one to join the next Spectre candidacy course could wait.

The apartment's door chime woke him from a light doze about half an hour later. Garrus triggered his omnitool and activated the link he'd programmed between his tool and the door intercom. "This is Vakarian. Who is it?"

"It's me," said a thoroughly unexpected voice. "This a bad time, Garrus, or can I come in?" she asked.

"Commander?" asked Garrus, mandibles twitching in surprise. "Sure, just let me trigger the door for you," he said, calling up another of the remote-access keys he'd programmed into his omnitool since moving in. "Should be open."

She was wearing an Alliance commander's dress uniform and swept her officer's cap off in the automatic manner of any soldier as she entered. "You'll forgive me if I don't stand up," said Garrus. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"

Shepard chuckled. "It's fine, Garrus. Not like I'm your C.O.," she said. "Mind if I sit down?" she asked, gesturing at the emptier of the two chairs that filled out the apartment's furnishings and served to cramp the already limited space in the combined living room/dining room area. "Just came from the memorial service for the ships we lost in the battle and I'm sick of standing."

"Sorry about the mess, Commander," he said, gesturing for her to take a seat. "I heard about the service they had planned. I'm sorry I couldn't attend. C-Sec is so short-handed right now that Executor Pallin is willing to overlook my…less than professional departure from the job to join you if it means he's got another warm body in a uniform at headquarters to help push paper. I'm still applying for reenlistment through normal channels, but for right now it appears my resignation was…creatively misfiled." He shook his head, mandibles spreading in the Turian version of a smile. "Who'd have thought Pallin had renegade bone in his body, eh?"

Shepard chuckled as she sat down. "That does seem rather out of character for him, but given what's happened you can hardly blame him for a little creative misfiling." Reaching up, she brushed a few strands of hair out of her eyes with one hand as she rested her dress uniform's cap on one knee. "How's the foot?"

"Hurts, but it'll heal," he replied. "And you? Ribs and arm still mending properly?"

"Yeah. Glad they didn't make me stand for the service, that's for damn sure," she replied. "Finally getting used to trying to do anything with this cast on," Shepard said, holding up her left hand. Only fingers and thumb emerged from the end of the cast, the better to keep her wrist immobile. "I just wanted to stop by to let you know that they've completed repairs on the Normandy."

"Joker must be pleased," said Garrus. "I suppose that means you'll be shipping out again, to frag some more Geth."

Shepard nodded. "Yes, we're departing tomorrow. Can't say where, obviously. " She grinned and shook her head. "I never thought I'd find myself saying this, but it will be strange leaving with just a human crew on board."

Garrus' mandibles parted again in a turian smile. "The Normandy's a fine ship, commander. I'm sorry to leave her…but I'm not sorry to have access to good food again," he replied. The complaint about bad dextro-rations was an old one, and a running joke to the rest of the crew by now. It was hard to find anything other than bare-bones nutrient pastes and emergency rations in human space. Shepard had looked, he knew. "Good luck out there, commander."

"I don't need luck. I've got ammo, the Normandy, and a hell of a crew," she retorted, and the two shared a laugh at the joke. "I wanted to thank you for your help, Garrus," she continued, her mood sobering almost immediately. "I realized at the memorial service that I never thanked you properly for putting your ass on the line—helping me hunt down Saren and stop Sovereign—for some human you'd never seen before in your life. The crews and fighter pilots we lost…they were soldiers in the chain of command, following orders. But you? You followed me because your gut told you it was the right thing to do. I'm not sure if that makes you brave, crazy, or a little of both, but I do know this…" She paused and rose to her feet, replacing her cap. Coming to attention, she offered him a salute. "You've earned my gratitude and my trust. It was an honor, Garrus. If there's anything I can do to return the favor someday, well, consider this Spectre in your debt."

The turian was more than a little taken aback by Shepard's words. It took him a few moments to figure out how to respond to that. The most obvious part was to return the salute, as silly as it must have looked with him sitting there on his couch, one foot propped up on the coffee table. "I…thank you, Shepard," he says after the silence had stretched to the point of awkwardness between them. "I'm not sure what else I can say, except that it was an honor to serve under you and learn from your example."

She smiled at him and turned to leave. "I should get back to the ship."

"Of course, commander, I understand," Garrus replied. He fumbled for his crutch and rose. "I can see you out, at least," he said as he fought back a wince; lowering his foot that quickly always sent an unpleasant pulse of pain up his leg. "Stop in when you have some shore leave, commander. My door is always open for you or anyone else from the Normandy." He paused as they reached the door, mandibles twitching nervously as he debated saying what was on his mind or not. Shepard noticed that.

"Something else on your mind, Garrus?" she asked, quirking an eyebrow.

"Just…stay safe out there, Commander," he said awkwardly after a few seconds' further deliberation. "I…" _have never been happier to see anyone than I was when I saw you emerge from what was left of the Council Chamber_ "…I'll be burying a lot of friends from C-Sec in the wake of this mess. I'd prefer it if you didn't join them, commander."

She replied by reaching up to place a small hand on Garrus' shoulder. "I'm sorry, Garrus," she said quietly. She was a soldier; she understood.

_Zakera Ward, C-Sec Precinct, One Month after Sovereign's Destruction_

Garrus had settled into something resembling a routine since his readmission to C-Sec a week earlier. Apparently between the "creative misfiling" of his resignation and saving the Citadel, even Executor Pallin thought it was worth fast-tracking his readmission to the ranks of C-Sec. He was still waiting to hear back on whether or not he had been accepted to the Spectre candidacy program, but he was fairly certain he would be admitted. They had wanted to recruit him years ago, and he had only grown more skilled in the intervening years, after all.

It was a struggle to live up to the promise he'd made Shepard—that he would look for the best way to solve a problem, rather than simply the quickest path to his desired outcome. The bureaucracy had its place (well, at least some of it)—he was willing to admit that now—but old habits were hard to break.

His omnitool beeped at him urgently, interrupting his scan through a highlight reel of surveillance footage seized from an illegal biotech lab two nights ago. Pausing the feed, he tapped a key on his omni's haptic interface and did a double-take as Captain Anderson appeared on his screen. The older human did not appear happy; Garrus had gotten much better at reading human expressions during his time on the Normandy, not that he'd been bad at it before. "Captain Anderson. Is there something I can do for you?" he asked, careful to keep his tone neutral.

"Officer Vakarian. I…I'm afraid I have bad news…"

* * *

Author's Note: Herpadederp. x.x Just realized I have one man as humanity's councilor in this chapter and the other option in a later chapter. Gotta be consistent. Sorry for the screw up!


	2. Chapter 2: Reunion

Reunion

A twitch of the eye was all that was needed to trigger Shepard's combat implant. Adrenaline surged through her nervous system and the world slowed to a crawl as she ducked out from behind what was left of a support pillar and lined up a shot, right in the middle of all four of that batarian bastard's eyes as rounds from the gunship's rotary cannon shattered floor tiles around her and sparked off her shields. The Blue Sun chapter commander's head exploded, splattering what was left of the windscreen in gore. The corpse twitched in the pilot's seat, sending the gunship out of control. It plummeted out of view and crashed into the side of the building with enough force to puncture the badly damaged craft's fuel tanks. The fireball mushroomed into view as the adrenaline surge faded and the world returned to normal speed; Shepard breathed a sigh of relief. They were safe enough, for now; time to check on Vakarian.

"Mordin, get over here!" she barked as she collapsed the sniper rifle down to its transportable form and secured it to the mag strip on her left shoulder. The turian lay in a widening pool of his own blood, a shocking indigo against the grey-white flooring of Archangel's hideout. She knelt by his side to check his vitals, kneepads slipping slightly in the mess on the floor, as Garrus suddenly returned to consciousness with a gasp and weakly clutched at the barrel of his rifle. "Come on, Garrus, stay with me!" Shepard ordered as Mordin finally got his aging salarian ass over there to assist. Together, they rolled him over onto his back as Jacob called for a shuttle and Shepard triggered his armor system's Medi-gel dispenser. It slowed but could not stem the indigo tide rushing from Garrus' neck and face. His eyelids fluttered and his eyes found hers, at least briefly, before they seemed to glaze over just a bit and he slipped back into unconsciousness. "Damn it, Vakarian, you don't get to die on me!" she all but shouted, resisting the urge to slap the good side of his face to try and wake him back up.

"Shouting unlikely to be helpful. Need to stabilize head and neck, ensure airway does not become blocked," said Mordin in his characteristic short, clipped, and matter-of-fact tone. This was followed, as ever, by the sharp intake of breath that came after Mordin said more than two sentences. "Blood loss significant; Normandy's medbay equipped with turian blood packs or synthetic equivalents?"

Shepard nodded as she propped Garrus' torso up on her knees, hands cradling his face to hold it steady while Mordin did what he could to augment the insufficient Medi-gel treatment she'd applied. "The Illusive Man might be a two-faced son of a bitch, but he made sure the new Normandy's sickbay was equipped to treat everyone I might be recruiting to hit the Collectors," she replied. "Chakwas treated Garrus during the hunt for Saren; she'll know what to do once that damned shuttle arrives," she added, for once pre-empting the Salarian before he could ask about the Normandy's doctor.

"Ah, excellent. Shepard, need to…"

The commander tuned the salarian's hyperactive chattering out for the most part, adjusting her grip on Garrus' head or his position when indicated but otherwise paying Mordin no mind. Instead she was focused on the unconscious turian on her lap and far too aware of the blood pool she was kneeling in. It never bothered her when it was the enemy's but this turian blue was all leaking from Garrus. He'd had her back from the minute they met in Dr. Michel's clinic back on the Citadel over two years ago, and for no reason other than that she was tasked with tracking down and taking down Saren Arterius. He had survived firefights with geth, krogan, batarians, husks, pirates, slavers, and even the odd run from a thresher maw on some of the errands that Alliance command had laid out for her. Hell, he'd survived the shootout with the goddamned abomination that had been Saren and the rain of debris that had decimated the Council Chamber after Sovereign's destruction. How the hell could he possibly die now, after holding off three merc bands for days single-handed, and after they had turned every last one of the bastards into a smear on a wall or floor somewhere in this hideout? _No. Not a chance in hell. You do __**not **__have my permission to die today, Garrus. You hear me, Vakarian? I didn't save your ass from those mercs just to watch you goddamn bleed out all over me! I still owe you a favor, remember? Even if I'm not a Spectre anymore. Where's that goddamn shuttle?_

The shuttle's arrival and return to the Normandy all passed in a blur of blood and worry and occasional panicky returns to consciousness on Garrus' part. Chakwas and Mordin had taken charge after touchdown, with a couple of crewmen that Chakwas had pulled away from the mess hall serving as orderlies during the return flight, leaving Shepard alone with her worries and Garrus' indigo blood slowly drying onto the knee- and shinguards of her armor. She had hosed off her armor in the shuttle wash bay as they hauled Garrus' stretcher from the shuttle and hustled for the elevator, then stowed her gear and headed for her cabin and a hot shower.

Now, she paced the briefing room in her Cerberus uniform, the decorations noticeably absent; she had cut them off the shoulders of the outfit the moment she came aboard. She would work with Cerberus to take down the Collectors, take their money, their resources, their intel, and anything else they had to offer to see the job through, but she would be damned before she wore their insignia anywhere on her person.

They'd assured her she would be the first to know when Garrus' condition changed. They'd told her to grab some shut-eye because the procedure was likely to take hours, or perhaps even all night. She'd tried to sleep, but sleep wouldn't come. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw Garrus on the floor, gasping, in a widening pool of his own blood. So she'd gotten up, and dressed, and paced her cabin for a while, trying to distract herself by reading copies of the mission reports Miranda was passing to the Illusive Man following each successful recruiting operation. Focusing on the datapads, however, was a chore in and of itself, never mind actually processing the words. After finding herself rereading the same few sentences for a sixth time and not actually registering any of the words, she flung the pads onto the desk in disgust and stalked to the elevator.

The privacy screens to the windows in sickbay were active when she got to the crew deck and the door sealed against outside entry with cautions about biohazards and open air exposures flashing across the control panel in a dozen languages, forcing Shepard to alternate between pacing the mess and lounging in one of its chairs, at least until reveille sounded and the day crew de-bunked to catch Rupert's morning grub while the night crew headed for the bunks. Shepard had ducked into the elevator then and come here, to the briefing room, to pace. At least here the only one likely to interrupt her was EDI, but the AI had learned after several attempts that Shepard wasn't really in the mood to be told to behave logically right now.

And why was that, exactly? Sure, Garrus was a friend—probably the first turian that Shepard could honestly say that about. She'd watched friends get injured and killed back on Elysium, though. Jenkins died in front of her on Eden Prime, and she'd listened as Ashley and the salarians were overwhelmed on Virmire. In each of those cases, she'd moved on as life and the mission required. So why in hell was she so hung up on Garrus? Shepard stopped her pacing and surveyed the hologram of the new Normandy that hung in the air above the empty center of the briefing room table, noting the overall similarities to the original ship but also how vastly different this new Cerberus copy was. That's when it hit her. _Garrus is probably the only sentient on this ship I would trust with my life implicitly…because everyone else is Cerberus._

Oh sure, Doctor Chakwas and Joker were with her…but with his Vrolik's Syndrome Shepard doubted whether Joker could fight his way out of a wet paper bag. The doctor was…well…a doctor. She trusted them, of course, but they weren't ground-pounder combat material. Miranda was a goddamn Cerberus cheerleader, blind to the fact that the organization and the Illusive Man were both twisted and evil. Jacob played the part of the reluctant Cerberus agent, but this was Cerberus for God's sake. They'd copied the most advanced warship in the Alliance fleet—even improved upon it—gotten away with murdering a Systems Alliance rear admiral, absconded with some of Saren's cloned Rachni, and brought her back from the dead…surely they could find (or engineer?) a competent soldier who was also a good actor and stick him on the team to try and allay Shepard's fears.

The simple fact of the matter was, she realized, that she trusted Mordin further than she could throw either Miranda or Jacob at this point. She'd known him for maybe a day, tops, at this point, and yet she was more willing to trust him than the two Cerberus agents. _Garrus, you don't get to die. I need someone I know I can trust on this ship._

The door to the briefing room hissed open and Jacob entered, snapped to attention, and saluted. Shepard returned it and Jacob took it as a sign to drop the formality, which was fine by her. He took a position on the opposite side of the briefing room table from her before speaking.

"Commander. We've done what we could for Garrus, but he took a bad hit."

_Yeah, tell me something I don't know,_ she thought silently, resisting the urge to roll her eyes at the junior officer's amazing grasp of the patently goddamn obvious.

"The docs corrected with surgical procedures and some cybernetics. Best they can tell, he'll have full functionality, but…"

Jacob's words hung in the air ominously until the door hissed open again…and there he was, half his face hidden behind some kind of artificial graft-bandage, his armor burned and shot to hell from the rocket impact, his customary eyepiece on as always. She couldn't help but smile; the last time she'd felt this relieved was after escaping the rubble of the Council Chamber to find Garrus and Tali injured but alive and being assisted by an Alliance rescue team led by Captain Anderson.

"Shepard," said Garrus, nodding to her.

"Tough son of a bitch," said Jacob, clearly impressed by the turian's resilience. "Didn't think he'd be up yet."

"Nobody would give me a mirror," Garrus said as he entered the briefing room. "How bad is it?" he asked, reaching up to stroke the graft-bandage holding his face together.

Shepard had to bite back a laugh. "Hell Garrus, you were always ugly. Slap some face paint on there and no one'll even notice," she answered, still smiling.

Garrus laughed, and immediately regretted it; Shepard winced sympathetically and regretted her choice of words. There was a time for cracking wise, and this wasn't it, if only because Garrus couldn't enjoy a laugh from a good wisecrack without paying for it. "Hah, aaaah, don't make me laugh…damn it, my face is barely holding together as it is…" he said. It took a moment but the turian fired back with a wisecrack of his own. "Some women find facial scars attractive. Mind you, most of those women are Krogan…"

Shepard, still smiling, chuckled and shook her head. Jacob wisely intuited that now would be a good time to make an exit; he snapped to attention and fired off another salute before leaving the briefing room. Garrus wasted no time in getting down to why he was really checking in once Jacob had left.

"Frankly, I'm more worried about you. Cerberus, Shepard. You remember all those sick experiments they were conducting?" he asked. Doubtless EDI was still monitoring every word they said, and that this conversation would wind up in some report on the Illusive Man's desk in the near future. It didn't matter; she doubted anything she or Garrus could say would do more to damage their relationship with Cerberus than wiping out those cells of theirs two years ago had.

She nodded, stepping closer to Garrus. "Oh, believe me, I remember. But that's why I'm glad you're here, Garrus. If I'm walking into hell, I want someone I trust watching my back," she replied.

He shook his head a little. "You realize this plan has me walking into hell too, right?" he asked. "Heh, just like old times," he said, mandibles parting slightly in a gesture Shepard had come to interpret as the Turian equivalent of a grin or smirk. "I'm fit for duty whenever you need me, Shepard. I'll settle in and see what I can do with the forward batteries."

Shepard quirked an eyebrow at him. "You sure you wouldn't prefer some rack time? You just went through your own private hell down there; I don't want you burning out," she said, moving closer and putting a restraining hand on one shoulder.

Garrus paused for a moment, mandibles open, then looked away. "After the last couple days, working on some big-ass cannons will be a vacation, Shepard. …but thanks," he replied, gently brushing her hand off.

"Okay Garrus, it's your call. Just don't push yourself too hard," Shepard replied, taking a step back. "It's good to have you back."

The turian laughed again, then cursed and put a hand to his ruined face. "Damn it, didn't I tell you not to make me laugh?" he quipped, the tone in his voice indicating he was joking. "But seriously, Shepard…the feeling is mutual," he continued, his tone reverting back to what Shepard considered 'serious Garrus' and his mandibles parting again into that turian smile of his. With a sharp nod, Garrus turned and left the briefing room.

Shepard followed a few moments later, all smiles, and hit the tech lab to see how Mordin's work on upgrading their gear was coming—only to have the salarian shoo her out of the lab and pass on an order from Dr. Chakwas that she was to get some rack time herself. _Damnable meddling medical officers…_

"Commander, you have-"

"Later, Ms. Chambers. Our esteemed doctor has ordered me to bed," Shepard said, cutting off the yeoman. "EDI, have Joker plot us a course for the relay and the Korlus system. We've got a Krogan to pick up. I'll be in my cabin."


	3. Chapter 3: Hour of the Wolf

Hour of the Wolf

Garrus woke with a startled gasp, chilled to the bone on the bunk he'd been assigned in the crew quarters. He'd managed to throw the blankets off in his sleep, leaving only a sheet (flannel, the humans called the material) between him and the frigid air of the Normandy's bunk room. The human in the bunk above snored on, seemingly oblivious to Garrus' sudden wakefulness, for which the turian was grateful. He reached up and tapped his visor, causing the holographic display to spring to life and giving him a little more light to see by. Between the all-too-vivid dream he'd just had and the burning throb of the ruined side of his face, he knew he wasn't getting back to sleep without help.

Forget the lousy dextro-rations; as far as Garrus was concerned, the worst part of serving on a human ship was waking in the middle of the night to use the head. He swung his legs out from under the tangle of sheet and blankets and winced as his feet touched the frigid deck plates; the thermals he wore did little to insulate against such direct contact with cold. Not for the first time, he inwardly cursed the turian homeworld for being so much warmer than the homeworlds of the other Council races.

Hurriedly, he found the bottle of painkillers by visor light, shifting from foot to foot as his toes started to freeze. Dr. Chakwas had given him to supplement the Medi-gel drip system of the graft bandage, and for that he was grateful. Either she or Mordin would swap the bandage daily and insert a fresh Medi-gel dispenser, but there were times when the pain overwhelmed the analgesic properties of the gel…such as now. Bottle in hand, he made his way out of the crew quarters and was on his way to the mess for some water when he decided something a little stronger would be more helpful. Changing course, the turian padded towards the lounge instead. _Just enough to get comfortably numb. Spirits only know what Shepard will need me for tomorrow…_

A turian talon swept over the control panel and the door opened, revealing an almost painfully bright lounge interior. "Hey EDI, is there something wrong with the environmental controls in here?" he called out, knowing the ship's AI had terminals throughout the ship for the crew to interact with.

The answer to his query didn't come from EDI, though. "Sorry, Garrus. Thought I had the place to myself." It was Shepard's voice, but she didn't sound like her normal self. He couldn't quite "put a finger on" why that was, exactly. Humans had some very odd, but sometimes strangely apt, sayings.

The lights dimmed to a level Garrus found comfortable and he stepped inside. As the door closed behind him, Garrus noticed two other odd things: the shutter to the lounge viewport was closed, and the room was significantly warmer than normal. "Commander…?" Garrus asked softly, hesitating there by the door. It wasn't out of modesty; both he and Shepard were military and had long ago learned to ignore feeling awkward around others when wearing a minimum of clothing. He was unsure whether she would welcome his company or not.

Shepard was seated at the bar, an open bottle in front of her and a shot glass in one hand. She was dressed down as well, he realized, wearing what he remembered were called "sweatpants" and a "hoodie." Her hair was not neatly combed as usual, either. "You waiting on an engraved invitation, Vakarian?" she asked him, not turning around. "Illusive Man figured we'd all need a few drinks at some point on this damn mission—there's turian brandy, vodka, and something very, very green under the bar, if you're looking for a sleep aid," she said. Despite the shot glass in hand, Shepard's bottle appeared untouched, which struck the turian as odd.

"You read my mind, Shepard," said Garrus, forcing his mandibles into a small turian smile, should Shepard choose to turn around and look at him now. She did not, and Garrus' forced smile vanished, replaced by tightened mandibles and a growing feeling of unease as he made his way to the bar. He knelt to search through the cupboard under the countertop, surveying what was available, and let out the turian equivalent of a surprised whistle. "Hot damn…Taetrian brandy…from 2132?" he exclaimed, pleased and surprised. "The Illusive Man might be a barefaced xenophobe, Shepard, but at least he didn't stock the bar with turian rotgut," he said as he grabbed the bottle and a glass for himself. Part of him felt guilty for cracking open such a well-aged bottle of brandy for such a trivial purpose—he knew his liquor, and he knew this particular liquor was supposed to be enjoyed following momentous occasions. _Ah, to hell with it. I've never been a very good turian anyway…_

The bar stool was awkward to sit on, but it beat the hell out of most of the other human furniture for turian comfort on this ship. Garrus set his glass and bottle down and then plopped the pill bottle down beside them. Glancing over, he noticed that Shepard had poured herself a shot from her bottle but hadn't downed it yet. Vodka, it looked like, if he remembered his human liquors properly.

"Well, now that I'm not drinking alone…" she said abruptly, raising the glass. "To your continuing good health, Garrus." So saying, she knocked the shot back and set the glass down again on the bartop. She didn't refill it right away, instead fiddling with it and staring at it very intently.

"Back at you, Shepard," he said as he poured his own shot before knocking it back to wash down the medication. "So…uh…commander…trouble sleeping?" he asked lamely. They had been friends before the original Normandy's destruction, and she had rescued him from certain death on Omega. His own troubles could wait, but he wasn't sure how to broach the topic of hers without like some two-bit holodrama shrink. Hopefully leading her into the conversation would work.

She didn't answer right away. After pouring herself another shot, she finally turned and looked at him. "Tell me, Garrus…do turians dream?" she asked. "Not…do your people have hopes and ambitions. I mean do your minds tell you stories while you're asleep?" Her face was paler than normal, and he could see the blood vessels in the whites of her eyes.

The question was unexpected, but the look in Shepard's eyes was even more so. If he'd been ordered to assign an emotion to what he saw, Garrus would have said 'haunted.' "Uh…yeah, actually. I think most of the sentient species dream to some capacity while they sleep," he replied, wondering if the commander had been 'lucky' enough to re-watch the visions she'd received from the Prothean beacons. Garrus had heard about how vivid and disturbing they were from Liara during his last tour of duty with the commander, but they'd never affected her like this that he'd seen.

"Can you control what you dream?"

Garrus grimaced, remembering his own nightmare. "Not even a little," he said, shaking his head.

"Damn," Shepard said with a sigh. "Well…bottoms up." She drained her glass before pouring herself another shot, and then poured Garrus one from his bottle. "So what's eating you, Garrus?" she asked after knocking back her third drink.

"You humans have some of the oddest sayings in the galaxy. You do know that, don't you?" Garrus replied, unable to keep from chuckling. He was pleased to see the quip provoke a momentary smirk from Shepard. With a sigh, he shook his head and picked up the shot glass, swirling the red-orange liquor around a few times before knocking back the drink. The alcohol traced a line of fire down his throat that slowly spread outward, warming him up from the inside. "You saved my ass back there on Omega, Shepard," he began. "But I never did tell you why it needed saving in the first place, did I?"

She turned and looked at him, shaking her head. Her shot glass remained empty and she didn't seem to want another drink. "You said the mercs got a drop on your squad while you were out, but you never did elaborate. You promised you would if I got you out, as I recall," she replied, and the ghost of a smirk crossed her face as she said that.

"Right…" he said, debating whether or not he needed another drink to continue this line of conversation. Garrus decided against it. Hands flat on the bartop, Garrus stared intently at his empty shot glass. "One of my squadmates, a turian by the name of Lantar Sidonis, sold us out," he began. The urge to ball his hands into fists and leave talon gouges in the plasticine bar top was almost overwhelming, but he fought it. Instead, he poured himself another drink and knocked it back angrily. "I let my feelings get in the way of my better judgment, and my squad paid for it," he continued, sighing with disgust.

"Feelings?" Shepard asked, raising an eyebrow. "Were you and he…?"

Garrus looked at her, cocking his head and raising a browplate in confusion, and then he realized what she was asking. "Spirits, no!" he replied with a chuckle. The levity didn't last long after that. "No…my head told me that he was another turian, like me—'turians are honorable, you can trust him.' My gut instinct disagreed. I knew something was wrong when he called me about the job he supposedly needed help with. But he was a turian, and part of my squad, and someone I'd come to trust and rely on. So I went. The mercs hit my…our…hideout while I was gone. Butler was my second in command—capable, but afraid to think outside the book. He was learning, though…" This time, he couldn't keep from balling a hand into a fist and slamming it down on the bar. "And now he's dead. They're all dead, Shepard, except Sidonis and me. I'm going to find him, Shepard, and I'm going to fix that."

"I take it you've got proof Sidonis is a traitor?" she asked.

Garrus nodded. "After Chakwas let me out of sickbay I put out feelers with some contacts back on the Citadel. Sidonis cleared out his personal accounts and booked transport off Omega the day before he drew me away from our hideout. He was on the damn shuttle while my team was getting slaughtered!" He drew his mandibles in close to his face, his breathing slow and deep to force himself to calm down. Getting angry about it now wouldn't help anyone; it would just make it harder for him to get back to sleep, alcohol in his system or no.

"I'm sorry, Garrus," Shepard said quietly, reaching over to place a hand on his arm. It was a human thing, he knew, a gesture meant to comfort or reassure the recipient. "As I recall, I still owe you a favor, so if you need help finding him…"

Garrus looked at her, puzzled. "Wait…what are you talking about?" he asked after a brief silence.

Shepard laughed, but there was a bitterness to it, Garrus could tell. She reached up and pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes, rubbing at them fiercely for a few moments. "Right, I forgot…for you it's been two years and more since that chat in your apartment…" she said with a sigh. "…but not for me."

The turian's mandibles parted and his eyes widened, the turian equivalent of a human's surprised 'o' mouth. Now he remembered what Shepard was talking about. The commander had stopped by his temporary housing to say goodbye…the last time he'd seen her alive, until two weeks ago on Omega. She'd saluted him, he remembered, and told him she was in his debt for his help against Saren. He'd forgotten about that after the Normandy died, and her with it. It was, after all, rather hard to call in favors from the dead…

Garrus looked at her again, really looked at her, and studied her now. Red eyes meant she'd been crying. Asari did it, too, and their eyes looked the same after a crying fit. He'd seen that enough times in C-Sec, especially in the wake of the Battle of the Citadel. Too many people with missing loved ones, too many who learned that their husband or wife or daughter or lover or father or mother had been killed in a firefight with the geth, or by an explosion after Sovereign's destruction, or a stray disruptor torpedo impact. The room was warm to human sensibilities, roughly a comfortable room temperature by turian standards, yet Shepard was wearing what humans considered warm clothes. It was bright, too. _And the viewport is closed…oh Spirits...this has nothing to do with Prothean beacons._ Garrus' mandibles fluttered against his jaws as he tried to think of something to say, but really, what could he say? After the silence had stretched to the point of awkwardness between them and Garrus still hadn't found any words, he mimicked her earlier gesture, reaching over and tentatively placing a three fingered hand on her forearm. He was surprised at how small and delicate her arm felt under the material of the hoodie. Hell, he'd watched as she killed Garm by bashing the krogan's skull in with the butt of her shotgun not two weeks ago.

Shepard looked down at the turian's hand and Garrus noticed that she was surprised to see it there, but she didn't pull away. She looked up at him and offered him what he recognized as a sad smile. "Thanks, Garrus," she said quietly. His mandibles parted in a small turian smile and he patted her arm as he'd seen humans do before pulling his hand back.

"So…about that favor you owe me…" Garrus asked after a while.

"No, saving your ass from Omega doesn't count," Shepard replied with a light chuckle. She sounded…better. Not like Shepard, exactly, but not the way she'd sounded when he first came into the lounge. "I was trying to recruit Archangel, and as far as I knew Garrus Vakarian was busting heads on the Citadel, still wearing C-Sec blue and thinking I was dead." She paused and reached for a pitcher of water that sat on the bar in front of her and poured some into her glass. Shepard sipped at it for a few moments before continuing. "If you had known I was alive and if you had called me for help…" Her voice trailed off and she shrugged. "Garrus, you couldn't have known, and you didn't call. So if you ever find this Sidonis…say the word and I've got your back." She knocked back the rest of the glass of water. "Favor owed or no, when have I ever said no to my crew?" she asked him, reaching over to put a hand on his shoulder.

"Thanks, Shepard." Garrus poured himself a glass of water and stoppered the bottle of brandy. "And Shepard?"

"Hmm?"

"If you ever want to talk…well…you know where to find me."

Another small sad smile flashed across her face and she pulled her hand back. "You sure I won't interrupt your calibrations?"

The turian chuckled, a low rumbling sound emanating from the back of his throat. "For you, Shepard, I'll make the time," he replied, mandibles spread in a grin.

The two of them sat there for a long while, silent except for the sounds of their breathing and the occasional sip from a glass. Considering the circumstances that had sent them both to the lounge for a nightcap, it was, at least for Garrus, surprisingly soothing. It was Shepard who finally broke the silence.

"Well Garrus, I think I'm ready to try to catch some sleep. Thanks."

He turned to her and nodded, knowing that two old friends didn't have to talk about what was troubling them to find a little peace in each other's presence. "Sure, Shepard. Good night."

"So, same time tomorrow night?" she asked as she rose from her seat. He missed the smirk she flashed him as she asked the question.

"Oh sweet Spirits I hope not," Garrus said with a snort. Then he realized how that must have sounded. "…I didn't mean it like that, Shepard."

"Relax, Garrus," the commander laughed. "I know exactly what you meant. Sleep well."

"You too, Shepard."

* * *

Author's Note:

Been meaning to have one of these in here for a while now. Derp. Also mild spoilers for ME3 in the last paragraph; you have been warned.

First, nerd points to whoever gets the reference I'm making with the title of this chapter. :)

So about the casts in chapter 1…from the codex entries, Medi-gel sounds like it's intended for treatment of soft-tissue injuries only. I know there's some mention of the addition of delivery conduits to speed the healing of broken bones in some of Shepard's cybernetic upgrades from ME2, but that makes it sound like that sort of thing is very much the exception to the standard use of Medi-gel. If anybody has canon sources where Medi-gel is used to fix broken bones, please let me know so I can adjust things accordingly.

Not much to say about chapter 2 really. A bit concerned about how much concern I had Shepard showing for Garrus… Anybody have any thoughts on that?

On the whole "Garrus is cold" thing…We know Garrus grew up on Palaven, and from the location of "the big orange blaze" on the planet he points out during the mission on Menae, it seemed to me he grew up in the low- to mid-latitudes. With an average planetary surface temperature of 31° C (or, if you're an American like me, 88° F), I figure Garrus has to be far from comfortable at the standard range of human room temperatures (~65-70° F/18-21° C) they'd have things set at on the Normandy. Figure it's got to be perpetually like camping out in the dead of winter for the poor guy—or, at least, transplanting a human from Key Largo, Florida to Fairbanks, Alaska, in the spring or fall. So he wears turian long johns, and has flannel sheets and extra blankets on his bed. I have no idea if this is canon or not, but you never do see random NPC turians in the games in shorts, short sleeves, bare-handed, or bare-footed (er, as far as I can remember), and most have that funny little hat-thingy on their heads too. So yah, there's my justification for why Garrus is in long underwear and thinks the worst part about serving on the Normandy is getting up in the middle of the night to use the head (that's bathroom in naval jargon, for anyone who didn't know that already.) :)


	4. Chapter 4: Catching Up

Catching Up

The door to the main battery slid open with its customary mechanical hiss. Garrus was, for once, fiddling with his rifles rather than the Normandy's main guns, seated at his work bench. He was in the process of reassembling his Mantis, likely after giving it a thorough cleaning. Shepard didn't see the usual array of tools on the work bench that would indicate he was tweaking the scope or trying to get a few more centimeters per second out of the mass accelerator.

"…there we go, old girl…right back—Shepard. Wasn't expecting you," said the turian hastily. She could tell she'd caught him at an embarrassing moment, even if he couldn't blush. It was something about the eyes.

"I see you picked up Ash's habit of talking to your guns, Garrus. I didn't realize the two of you had hit it off so well," she said, teasing him a little bit.

Garrus' mandibles parted in the turian version of a grin. "I believe it had something to do with a dressing down you gave her, Shepard. Something about 'kissing a turian'?" he replied. The grin faded and he sighed. "Still hard to believe she's gone."

Shepard nodded. "Yeah, it is," she agreed. _Even harder to believe it's been two years..._ The door slipped closed behind her and she moved over to the other workbench and took a seat on it as Garrus put his Mantis on the workbench and swiveled the chair around to face her.

"So, need me for something?" He was still wearing the C-Sec armor he'd been wearing on Omega, blast marks and all.

"Not really…but remind me before I leave that you need new armor," she said with a shake of her head, disbelieving that he was insisting on keeping that suit. "We don't need anybody getting bright ideas that maybe they should shoot for the holes by your face because the shields might be weaker there."

The turian's mandibles opened in what Shepard recognized as surprise. "I…ah…hadn't thought of it like that. I would hate it if all of Dr. Chakwas' hard work were undone on account of some Blue Suns wiseass getting bright ideas, and then getting lucky with them."

"Yeah, I'd rather not have you bleeding all over my lap again from a massive head wound," she agreed. "Other than giving you shit about your armor, my only goal coming down here was to escape Cerberus for a little while." She held up a finger before he could point out EDI's access terminal off to her right. "Yeah, I know there's no escape from EDI. But it's nice to be in a part of the ship where that damned insignia isn't everywhere," she said, shaking her head in disgust. "So, how are you settling in?"

"Aside from…what was it Jack called Miranda the other day? A 'Cerberus cheerleader'?"

Shepard nodded in the affirmative and Garrus continued. "Aside from the cheerleader, nobody seems to mind my presence on board," replied the turian. He caught the look she was giving him and elaborated. "Miranda is professional enough, but it's something about the eyes…you see it a lot in the seedier parts of the Wards when you're in a C-Sec uniform. Suspicion, mistrust, restrained hostility. Everyone else seems to think that since I helped you take down Saren, my presence is a good sign for the mission. They're all polite enough, at least."

Shepard smiled a little, nodding her head in satisfaction. "That's good to hear. Anybody gives you any shit, Garrus, let me know and I'll straighten them out." She shrugged. "Or space them. You know, whichever is easiest."

It was an effort, but she kept her face blank as she said that, waiting for Garrus' reaction. His mandibles fluttered open and closed a few times, and once or twice he looked about to say something. "That was a joke, Garrus."

"I was going to say, I don't recall you ever threatening to space Navigator Pressley…"

"And how do you know I didn't, hmm?" she retorted, letting a wicked grin creep across her features. "You always had your head buried in the damn Mako when you weren't counting coup with Tali."

Garrus laughed a little bit but his laughter stopped abruptly and he tilted his head at her in that way of his when he'd been confused by something she said. "…counting what?"

With a laugh, she shook her head. "Sorry Garrus. Old human expression, God knows where it comes from originally," she replied, then realized she hadn't answered the question. "You two were keeping score of how many geth, or mercs, or pirates, or slavers you'd fragged on every drop." That explanation clearly was straightforward enough, because Garrus smiled that turian smile of his and nodded.

"Yeah, she was always at a disadvantage with that shotgun of hers. I mean sure, you eventually procured some modded high explosive rounds for her, so she could take out two or three with one shot…if I let them get close enough, that is…"

Based on the tone of his voice, Shepard could only assume the expression on Garrus' face was the turian version of a shit-eating grin. She shook her head at him, smirking. "You're not the only one with a steady sniping arm, remember?"

He laughed. "How could I forget? Mag-booting our way up the side of the Citadel Tower, fragging krogan and geth the second they popped into view, Sovereign looming larger with every step?" The turian shook his head. "How the hell did we get out of that alive, Shepard?" he asked, the disbelief evident in both his body language and the tone of his voice.

"High explosive rounds, good aim, and a whole lot of luck," she replied with a smile.

They fell quiet for a time, lost in the realization of how inordinately lucky the two of them were to be here, now, given everything they'd been through on the hunt for Saren. _Not to mention afterwards…_

"So what the hell happened with you and C-Sec, anyway?" she asked, finally breaking the silence. "Thought you were going back, trying to make a difference and play by the rules? Did you ever re-apply for Spectre candidacy, like you'd planned?"

Garrus let out a long breath, closing his eyes and slumping a little in his chair. Apparently it was an uncomfortable subject for him, because it took him a while to respond. "Well…you know what they say about old habits," he began. "They weren't any easier for me to kick than the next person, but I tried Shepard. Spirits, I tried. I lasted a few months at it, too. Executor Pallin was quite surprised by my turnaround and sudden fondness for policy and procedure."

Shepard had to grin when she heard that. "No more shoot-outs in hostage situations, hmm?"

"Hey, even you said I took him down clean, Commander," the turian shot back, but his tone of voice and the way his mandibles spread told her he knew she was ribbing him a little. He sighed. "And then, a month or two after you…after the Normandy…I noticed the Citadel NewsNet reports had stopped using Sovereign's name when talking about restoration or clean-up efforts in areas hit by Reaper debris. Now it was 'the geth flagship' this, and 'Saren's dreadnaught' that." Garrus looked up at her, meeting her eyes, and then shook his head. "Udina was all too happy to backslide on what Sovereign really was—about the only olive branch he was willing to extend to the Council, as far as I could tell—and the new Council…well…they didn't much approve of what happened to their predecessors or the Destiny Ascension, Shepard."

Shepard had heard something similar from Joker, though in his case, it had focused chiefly on how the Alliance had torn apart everything she'd done. It didn't make hearing it much easier, though. "You didn't much approve of my call there, either, as I remember," she said. "It was the only time you ever called me 'human.'"

Garrus met her gaze with his own and nodded. "You're right, I didn't. It seemed so utterly…well…out of character for you," he replied. When she made no move to interrupt, he proceeded. "Shepard, I was with you on Feros, remember? The whole mess with the thorian-controlled colonists? How many holes did they punch in us, yet you refused to return fire except with those damned gas grenades? And when you ran out, you made us take them down hand-to-hand?"

Shepard nodded. "Yes, Dr. Chakwas was not very pleased with the dent I made in our Medi-gel supplies after that mess," she recalled. A little smirk appeared on her face. "Nor were you," she added wryly.

"I enjoy being shot as much as the next sentient. Being turian just means I have more practice at it, not that I'm immune to the pain," Garrus fired back. "So yes, I was more than a little surprised when you made the call to sacrifice the Destiny Ascension and 10,000 lives to ensure the Alliance would have ships enough to take out Sovereign." He shook his head. "…and then I got my hands on some gun camera footage of the battle that was going on above our heads as we fought that…that…thing that had been Saren." He paused there, obviously searching for words. "Spirit of Palaven, Shepard…after seeing that, and knowing what you must have seen from the beacons…well…I still don't know whether you made the right call or not. What I do know is that it was the turian call to make."

Shepard listened quietly as Garrus spoke, then shook her head and chuckled a little. "I did 'the turian thing,' hmm?" she asked. "God damn, don't let that bitch from Westerlund News hear you say that…"

"Oh right, her!" Garrus exclaimed with a laugh after thinking about it for a few moments. "Yeah, I've got a feeling Westerlund News and Cerberus are best friends these days…"

"So the Alliance and the Council both threw me under the bus. That's not really why you left, though. I mean there's got to be more to it than that," Shepard prodded, trying to turn the conversation back on her original line of inquiry.

"What is a 'bus'?"

She shot the turian a look and he raised his hands.

"Kidding, Shepard, kidding," he said, chuckling. "Trying to evade the question with humor. Apparently I don't do it as well as Joker…" He sighed and fell silent, collecting his thoughts. "I just couldn't do it anymore, Shepard. The Council's backsliding on the Reapers and the Alliance's insult to your memory…they spit on you, and Ash, and the spirit of the Normandy herself!" he said, anger creeping into his voice until at last he was practically snarling. "Add in the same bureaucratic crap I could barely tolerate before I joined up to take on Saren and it was a recipe for disaster," he snapped, disgust evident in every word. "Omega was full of criminals nobody else could touch; hell yes I left C-Sec." There was a fire in his eyes and an edge to his voice as he spoke. "As for Spectre candidacy…yeah, I reapplied, and then withdrew before I quit C-Sec for the second time. Any Council willing to drag your name through the mud, ignore the evidence, and belittle the Normandy's spirit isn't worth my time."

"'The Normandy's spirit?'" Shepard echoed, quirking an eyebrow.

Garrus nodded. "It's a turian thing. We tend to believe our units—whether you're talking about a single fire team or a dreadnaught's crew—create their own…well…soul, I guess you'd call it." He paused, looking contemplative, and Shepard guessed he was trying to come up with an explanation that would make sense to a human. "It's an embodiment of the courage, skill, and dedication to the cause possessed by the soldiers or marines who form the unit. The spirit of the unit is forever, even if its membership changes. You can drag the name of a soldier from that unit through the mud so long as they deserve it and no attempt is made to explicitly link him or her to the spirit of the unit. But what they were doing to you, and to the Normandy? To tarnish a unit's spirit through outright lies?" He shook his head. "That's not done, Shepard. It's not right. It's not fair to the memories of the dead and it insults the living."

"So why'd they do it?"

The turian shrugged. "Human ship, human crew, with a token turian. Probably figured it was safe since, as you just demonstrated, the concept of a unit's soul is alien to humans," he offered. "Whatever their reasons, it was a contributing factor to my departure from C-Sec."

"So you showed up on Omega and just started taking out the trash?"

Garrus laughed a little. "Come on, Shepard, it wasn't that easy. I had to research my targets before I hit so I could get them alone, far from help, and avoid collateral damage. That was my rule: nobody suffers but the bastard in my sights." He smiled at her. "And I never once broke that rule."

"And thus the Archangel was born."

He shrugged. "Well, sort of. It took a couple of months before the nickname started spreading. Some humans gave it to me after I freed them from a krogan slaver. I had to look the term up on the extranet; the closest term in turian translates it as 'warrior-spirit' but from what I read, it's a bit more significant than that, isn't it?"

"You'd have to ask Ash about that," replied Shepard with a shrug. "There's an old human saying about how there are no atheists in foxholes, but I wouldn't exactly count myself among the religious," the commander elaborated. "That explains the name, at least. What about your squad?"

"Well, as you might guess, this Archangel fellow developed quite a reputation for kicking the criminal element of Omega right in the quad," he said, mandibles parting in a small turian smile. There was a note of pride in his voice, she could tell. He shrugged. "Like you demonstrated when you hunted down Saren: if you prove you get results, you attract like-minded people to your cause. We were a disparate bunch—disgruntled ex-C-Sec officers, private security contractors, even a few mercs looking to atone for their pasts. That rule I mentioned before, about nobody but the target suffering? That was the condition for joining the team. Anybody who wanted to join had to agree to that ground rule before we would even think of arranging a face-to-face. Then my tech specialist—batarian, unfriendly fellow, but I think he could have given Tali a run for her credits—and I would dig up everything we could find on their pasts and vet them. Anybody can pay lip service to an idea; they only got in if their background showed they were willing to, as you humans say, 'put their credits where their mouth was.'"

"Reasonable precautions," Shepard said with a nod. "Still, forming and equipping a squad isn't cheap; I should know." The two shared a chuckle at that. "Doesn't sound like you hired yourselves out to anybody, though."

"No, we didn't," Garrus confirmed. "We hacked our targets' accounts for credits and the locations of caches, disrupted weapons shipments and turned them against their intended owners, outright stole other shipments of credits or weapons, raided caches…you get the picture."

"No wonder the gangs hated you."

"Hah, that's the small-time stuff, Shepard. I haven't even gotten to the good parts," Garrus replied with a chuckle.

The turian looked like he was willing to continue without further prompting on Shepard's part, but EDI's odd pawn-shaped avatar erupted suddenly from the terminal by the door.

"Commander, priority message from the Illusive Man. He wishes to speak to you via the QEC in the briefing room."

"Understood, EDI. I'm on my way," Shepard told the AI. EDI's terminal went dark and Shepard turned her attention back to Garrus.

"I'm here when you need me, Shepard. Just say the word and I've got your back."

* * *

Author's Note: The brevity of your conversations with Garrus in ME2 always bugged me-clearly a lot of crap has happened in the two years since Shep's death and they should have a lot to talk about. That is why this chapter exists. Hopefully it covers more ground without boring anyone to tears. :)

We never seem to get a lot of turian culture from Garrus, which struck me as pretty odd-even as a self-confessed 'bad turian' he has to have taken something in from growing up on Palaven (especially with a traditionalist father who had the ear of Palaven's Primarch), hence the mention of the spirit of the Normandy. I also think we never got a really good explanation for why he left C-Sec (for those of you who Paragon'd him into going back) or the Spectre candidacy program (for those of you who Renegade'd him into never looking back at C-Sec), or (for those of us who Paragade'd him into trying for it) both. Hopefully I still managed to make it sound like Garrus. :)

Also I should probably mention that I've been on a roll with this story. I never guessed I'd get this much turned out this fast! :) I have a feeling this next chapter is going to take longer to put together-entering completely alien territory here. Please don't panic if you don't see anything for days and days. :)

And since I know I'm starting to get a few people interested in the story, I should probably have started saying this a while ago: thanks for reading! :D


	5. Chapter 5: Fallout

Fallout

"_You turned your back on everything we believed in. You betrayed the Alliance. You betrayed me."_

_No she didn't, Kaidan._ Garrus seized the human by his shoulders and drove a knee into his ribs hard enough to hear the unmistakable sound of snapping bone. Had this been any ordinary human, that crunching noise would have been followed by him collapsing into a ball on the decking, fighting to breathe. This, however, wasn't really a human. Instead, it was a hand-to-hand dummy constructed of self-healing rubberized synthflesh layered on over an equally resilient memory-resin skeleton. The dummy's skeleton wouldn't actually break, but was engineered to respond to bone-breaking force by sounding (eerily) like snapping bone before snapping back in place as though nothing had happened. For good measure, Garrus followed the knee to the ribs up with a head-butt to the nose, biting back a cry of pain as the shock of impact sent tremors through the ruined side of his face.

The Hierarchy's favored unarmed fighting style was brutal, efficient, and generally lethal when utilized in real fighting situations. Hierarchy soldiers were trained to employ less deadly versions of common techniques and pull punches when sparring their fellows. Even so, there were few recruits who managed to come out of basic without a few scars from over-enthusiastic or sloppy partners. Garrus' own scars from basic were visible, as he'd opted to train out of his armor for a change.

Garrus backpedaled away from the sparring dummy and dropped out of his fighting stance, one hand clutching at his ruined face to try and dull the pain that was lancing through it right now thanks to his ill-advised maneuver. He still couldn't believe how the "reunion" with Kaidan had played out after they'd managed to drive the Collectors from Horizon. It hadn't been his place to butt in during Shepard's futile attempt to reason with Kaidan, but he hadn't been able to help it. Alenko's stiff-necked inability to see the blindingly obvious had proven too much to bear and he'd snapped at the human, only to be ignored.

He had laid claim to a corner of the cargo hold near the elevator, rolling out a couple of the compact training mats and wheeling over a trio of dummies from the assortment of sparring gear Cerberus had equipped the new Normandy with for hand-to-hand drills. The full range of potential alien hostiles had not surprised the turian; he knew Cerberus and its reputation too well for that. However, he couldn't help but shake his head at the sight of a krogan dummy. After seeing Urdnot Wrex in action, Garrus was fairly certain anybody who wanted to go at a krogan hand-to-hand had decided to commit suicide but make it look like utter stupidity instead. The presence of a human dummy in the mix had surprised Garrus at first, but then he remembered the fate of Admiral Kahoku. Anyone who opposed Cerberus was a potential target. _Except Shepard and her team…Spirits only know how long __**THAT**__ truce will last…_

_Well at least you can't ignore me, can you, you inanimate lump of polymers?_ The turian moved back within striking distance of the dummy. Garrus went through the routine again, this time changing his fighting style to incapacitate rather than kill. Even with the less than lethal style turian officers learned upon joining C-Sec, suspects who resisted arrest did not fare well—nor did Garrus' sparring partner. A quick snap-kick from his lead leg hyperextended the dummy's knee in the wrong direction even as he launched himself forward off his back foot to deliver a palm-heel to the throat. Or, at least, that was Garrus' plan.

"Garrus? The yeoman said you wanted to…oh shit, sorry."

Shepard's voice startled Garrus, throwing off his kick. His foot connected with the dummy's knee and skidded off in between its legs, causing Garrus' first toe to hyperextend backwards painfully. The turian bit back a few choice profanities, hopping awkwardly over to the dummy to place a hand on its shoulder and prop himself up before gingerly setting his foot on the ground. "Shepard. Your timing sucks."

"You okay, Garrus?"

He nodded. "Yeah, I'll be fine. Nothing's broken," he replied.

"So…what's all this?" she asked, joining him on the mats and surveying the dummies. In particular, she was focused on the human dummy. Despite its self-healing construction, it still bore the marks of Garrus' claws and would for a few more minutes yet. The batarian and turian dummies remained untouched, save having been moved within easy striking distance of the battered human dummy.

Garrus followed her gaze. "Never fear, Commander, I wasn't picturing that it had Kaidan's face. Okay well maybe when I kicked it in the groin that one time…"

Shepard was, for once, not amused by the turian's wisecracking. "Why did you ask Yeoman Chambers to have me meet you down here?" she snapped.

Shepard's harsh reaction to his attempt at humor came as no surprise. "Because something is eating at you and has been since you radioed for pickup on Horizon," Garrus said bluntly. "I thought maybe you'd like to take it out on some training equipment rather than your crew." He gave her a look.

She didn't respond right away, but the icy glare she fixed him with was enough to make plain her annoyance. "Vakarian, I don't have time for this," Shepard snapped, whirling on her heel and making her way back to the elevator.

"Then make the time, commander!" Garrus snapped, limping after her and putting a hand on her shoulder.

She whirled and slapped his hand away. "Who the hell do you think you are, Vakarian?" she demanded, her eyes blazing with sudden fury.

"I think I'm your friend, Shepard," he replied, keeping his tone level, his eyes meeting hers and not wavering. "And I think a commanding officer biting an ensign's head off for no good reason is a liability to the crew on a mission like this." Garrus folded his arms in front of him and waited for her reply, his eyes never leaving hers.

The human glared up at him as the silence stretched between the two, cold fury in her eyes. It was more than a little disconcerting to see that expression directed at him; typically, the recipient of that look from Shepard tended to die shortly thereafter. "So you're a shrink _and_ a wiseass now, is that it?" Shepard asked finally, her tone icy.

Garrus couldn't help but roll his eyes. "No, but I know the turian reaction to being accused of treason by your lover typically involves violence, or at least a whole hell of a lot of shouting," he retorted. "And don't give me that look; even Liara knew there was something more than 'officer and subordinate' between you and Kaidan."

Something flashed across her face as he spoke, some odd flicker of human facial muscles that tried to process too many different feelings at once, he judged. The fire in her eyes had dimmed, if only a little. "Yeah, there was something more to us than that…" she admitted finally. She fell silent again, but it was a silence that only lasted a few moments. "So, you set all this up…why?"

The turian shrugged. "Bizarre alien biology or not, humans and turians tend to get pissed off about the same sorts of things. Don't get me wrong, Commander, I still think of Kaidan as a friend…but that doesn't mean I didn't want to beat some sense into him while we were down there."

A wry grin crossed her face for a heartbeat. "And since I've been snapping at the crew, you figured I must be having similar feelings about Kaidan."

"That's about it, yes," Garrus replied, nodding in agreement. "Shepard, I won't pretend I understand or even know how humans deal with lovers' quarrels beyond getting angry. I'm not trying to be a shrink. I just thought that if I wanted to punch Kaidan, you probably did too." He gestured back towards the dummies. "Care to join me?"

Shepard smirked. "I suppose it would be more professional of me to take out my frustrations on sparring equipment than innocent crewmen…" she replied, making her way over to the mats. "…but if you don't mind, I think I'd prefer it if we retired the human target…"

Garrus had fallen in step with her instinctually, dropping back a few paces and off to her left as he so often would on missions. "Sure, Shepard. You want the batarian or the turian?" he asked, manhandling the battle-scarred human target off the mats and back towards the cargo container it normally resided in. He was a little surprised by how long it was taking for the memory flesh to heal the claw marks he'd carved into it.

"Batarian," Shepard said instantly.

The turian made his way back over to the mats with the sound of Shepard's fists crashing into the dummy, usually accompanied by the snapping sound of its memory-resin bones breaking under the assault. Human fighting styles were so very alien to him, all on account of their lack of proper claws on those slim digits of theirs. They compensated for it, though, in the bewildering number of ways they would configure their hands for delivering a strike. He watched as she folded a thumb under her palm and delivered a strike that snapped the batarian dummy's trachea. Garrus watched her for a few moments, surprised at the strength she was capable of putting into every hit.

"Cerberus upgrades," she said, catching him staring, as she snapped the dummy's knee back in a direction it was never meant to bend without appearing to try.

Garrus' mandibles widened in surprise. "So going after Garm hand-to-hand wasn't as suicidal as it looked," he said, settling in beside her to work over the turian.

"No, it was," she replied, fists snapping batarian ribs. "I was just lucky Mordin had lit him up with a plasma bolt and you had punched a hole through several internal organs already when I turned my shotgun into a baseball bat."

"…a what?" the turian asked as he kicked out one of his mirror image's knees.

"A specialized type of club used in an old human game," she replied. Her knee came up between the batarian's legs as she rammed her forehead into its nose.

"Ah," replied Garrus as he snapped one of the dummy's mandibles with an open-hand strike, switching up the combo he'd been about to start on the human when Shepard had interrupted.

The two lapsed into silence, focusing on their routines. The cargo hold echoed with the sounds of their blows hitting home. Garrus had gotten into a good rhythm, switching between subdual and lethal techniques after each combo. It helped keep the exercise interesting. Shepard, meanwhile, seemed bound and determined to actually, literally, break the batarian dummy's skeleton. Every elbow strike, every knee, every punch, every kick caused the memory resin skeleton to deform with that not-quite-real sound of snapping bone. She was working into a frenzy, he realized, as every strike came harder and faster. The turian stopped his own workout, turning to her and about to suggest she might want to tone it down— He didn't even see it, she moved so fast. He heard the impact, though, and saw the end result. The batarian dummy's head lolled disgustingly, a jagged spar of memory resin representing its spinal cord stabbing up through torn synthflesh.

"Huh," Shepard said dully, looking at the hand that had delivered that blow. Garrus noticed that her knuckles were bruised, raw, and bloodied, but nothing about her posture suggested she was in significant pain. "Cerberus upgrades indeed…"

"…I…uh…guess you needed to work a lot more out of your system than you realized…" he offered lamely, trying to fill the awkward silence that had descended on the cargo hold.

Shepard didn't respond except to sigh and make her way to the bulkhead, which she promptly leaned against before putting her back to it and slumping to the deck plates. The last time Garrus had seen her like this had been after that weasel Udina had grounded the Normandy. Kaidan had been there for her then—should be here for her now. Instead, though, he was the cause, Garrus knew. _Damn it all, Kaidan…_ He stood, frozen, awkward and uncertain, knowing he should do something but uncertain of what that something ought to be. Eventually, he opted to follow her. He figured he wouldn't have to say anything, like those nights they'd found each other in the lounge, self-medicating to chase away the nightmares. If it actually worked out that way, all the better. What the hell would he even say in a situation like this, anyway?

"Hey, EDI, think you could lock the elevator out from this level?" he asked quietly as he padded over to where Shepard sat in morose silence on the deck. "The crew shouldn't see the commander like this."

"Very well, Officer Vakarian," replied the AI, and the holo interface on the elevator door glowed red.

"I heard that," Shepard murmured as Garrus slipped into an awkward seated position beside her. "Cerberus was very thorough with their upgrades. Thanks."

"You know me, Shepard. Always eager to help," he replied as he shifted position to try and get more comfortable. It was a relatively futile effort, he knew. The deckplates were cold beneath him and the bulkhead at his back equally so. Shepard shook her head, and something about her body language told Garrus she had already moved on to some other line of thought.

"What in the hell was that?" Shepard asked finally.

Garrus' mandibles fluttered a little. "An impressive display of Cerberus' skill with cybernetic augmentation?" he offered eventually, uncertain what, exactly, she was asking about.

A bitter laugh and a shake of her head. "No, I meant…Kaidan, Horizon, that whole fucking mess. What the hell was that?"

Something about the tone of her voice and the way she asked the question made it clear to Garrus that it wasn't being asked in a rhetorical sense. _Spirits…_ Silence was his only response as he tried to think of a diplomatic answer, rather than immediately blurting out, _"That was Kaidan being a blind, ignorant jackass."_ Eventually, he found something to say. "Shepard…that was Kaidan being…well…Kaidan."

"How do you figure?" she asked with a quirk of her eyebrow.

"You remember how badly he took those missions where we were cleaning up Cerberus' experiments from hell gone awry?" Garrus asked, working to keep his tone even and choosing his words carefully. "Or the aftermath of Virmire? How convinced he was you'd saved him because you two were…close, and not because there was no way to be certain the nuke would go off with geth crawling all over the bomb site?"

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"The man thinks with his heart, commander. Not his head," Garrus replied. "Now I'm not saying that as a slight, mind," he added hastily, looking at Shepard to judge whether or not it was safe to continue this line of thought or if he should quit while he was ahead. She didn't look too happy with what he was saying, but she also didn't look like she was about to give him the same treatment that had annihilated the batarian dummy's neck, so the turian opted to soldier on. "Cerberus is a monstrous, evil organization. They cannot possibly, under any circumstances, do anything good or right. He knows you agree with him—if you hadn't, why would you have gone to such lengths to dismantle every operation you found out about? And yet…suddenly…here you are, admitting to being 'rebuilt' by Cerberus. Do you see where I'm going with this, Shepard?"

The woman nodded. "Damn, Garrus, since when were you so insightful?" she asked.

"You make for a pretty terrible police officer if you can't learn to think how your suspects think, and I know Kaidan a hell of a lot better than I ever knew any of the perps I busted on the Citadel," Garrus replied, mandibles spreading in a small turian smile.

"Point taken," Shepard admitted, though she did not smile back.

The silence lapsed between them again for a while, Garrus fidgeting uncomfortably as the cold from the _Normandy's_ bulkheads seeped into him. She broke the silence. "So…why are you still here?"

Again, it was a question he didn't understand but that she expected an answer to. "Uh…because you haven't indicated I should leave?"

That provoked a ghost of a grin and a brief chuckle. "No…I mean, why did you stick around on a Cerberus ship?"

Garrus found himself ticking off answers on his fingers. "First, it's not a Cerberus ship. It's your ship, Shepard. Second, nothing quite says, 'thanks for saving my ass,' like bailing at the first opportunity. Third, it's not like I've got anything better to do. Fourth…shit, out of fingers, have to switch hands…"

Shepard smirked again and another chuckle passed her lips. "Seriously, Garrus. Why are you here when Kaidan isn't? Why did you give me the chance to explain what the hell is going on, when my l—" She paused, catching herself before she can say the word. "…when he wouldn't?"

_Shit…_ Naturally she wanted a real answer and not wisecracking from him. It took him a few moments to figure out just what to say. "For starters, you saved my ass back on Omega. I figure that obligated me to at least hear you out. I knew how much you hated Cerberus, too, and I was with you on most of those strikes on their facilities; you wouldn't be working with them without some kind of damned good reason. Second, what the hell kind of friend would I be to say, 'thanks for the rescue, but I'm out next time you hit the Citadel?'" Now it was Garrus' turn to pause as he considered his words carefully, trying to figure out how to say what he wanted without sounding like some idiotic love interest from a holo romcom. Naturally, there was no other way to say it. _Shit… _"Third…Shepard, I'm not…I've…" his voice trailed off and he tried to start again. "I left the _Normandy_ and a month later, you're dead. I left my team on Omega, and the mercs slaughtered them—"

"Garrus, none of that was your fault—" she began, cutting him off.

He, in turn cut her off. "Just let me finish," he said, perhaps a bit more fiercely than necessary. "The point I'm trying to make is…I wasn't there, and friends—people I cared about—died." He stared down at the cold deckplates, sighing. "So…I'm with you, Shepard, 'come hell or high water' as you humans say. Maybe we're all as good as dead and we just don't know it yet, maybe we'll make it out in one piece…I don't know. I do know that I'm not letting you do this without me."

He felt a five-fingered hand on his shoulder, a welcome patch of warmth through the thin training fatigues he was wearing considering the temperature here. Garrus looked over to see her studying him, her eyes in particular flicking over to the ruined side of his face. Her expression was hard to read, even for him, but he was familiar with the gesture. When he started working for C-Sec, Garrus had been surprised to learn that humans, with such expressive faces, felt such a need to convey their feelings through touch as well as word and body language. What was it, exactly, that she was trying to say but didn't trust herself to say? He couldn't tell. Garrus knew her better than anyone else on the ship, but there were times when even his knowledge of her failed him. Times like now. Their eyes met and he noticed hers were wet. His mandibles fluttered slightly and she turned away, closing her eyes.

"You're a good man, Garrus Vakarian," she said softly, voice thicker than it had been a moment ago. She pulled her hand away and pushed herself to her feet, moving for the elevator.

"Shepard…are you all right?"

"No. But thanks for asking."

* * *

Author's Note:

Well, I warned you not to expect quick updates from me, but even I agree this is pretty ridiculous. Sorry folks.

This was the toughest chapter to write out of the bunch so far—every paragraph was like pulling teeth, I was never happy with it, and I scrapped the first page or two more than once in my efforts to get this thing written. Overall, though…well, I'm fairly happy with the results. Feel free to let me know if I failed (or succeeded)!


	6. Chapter 6: Angel of Vengeance

Angel of Vengeance

_I'm sorry, Shepard, but words aren't going to solve this problem._ He had been right about that. But words were all she had left.

Meeting up with Garrus after he'd taken down Sidonis had been...unpleasant. The turian had been uninterested in talking and she couldn't really blame him. Cowardice and betrayal were not things turian culture tolerated in the slightest, nor did Garrus. Shepard had hoped that perhaps the situation might play out the way the run-in with Dr. Saleon had two years earlier. That was foolish, she realized-but only afterward. Dr. Saleon had only wounded Garrus' pride; Sidonis had stabbed him in the back and left him to die from the wound. Her interference had made Garrus wonder whether she was going to find some way to let that bastard walk away and escape his justly earned reward. The ride back to the nearest transit hub that would get them to the docking bays had passed in brittle, icy silence. She found it a relief to return to the Normandy and get some distance between them. She'd gone to her cabin to change out of her armor and he had disappeared back down to his forward battery hidey-hole.

That was a week ago now, and there was still something off between them. He hadn't refused to come along on missions, but he also hadn't addressed her as "Shepard" since that day on the Citadel either. He was coldly professional with her, and something about that hurt more than she would have guessed. Shepard had given him his space, his distance, his time…but whatever wall her actions had inadvertently placed between them had yet to come down. She didn't think for a moment he was going to leave, not until the mission was over at any rate, but she didn't like what had happened to their friendship.

Shepard stared at the email she'd gotten from Nalah Butler, seeing but not reading the text. She had gotten it weeks ago, after rescuing Garrus. Up until now, she'd seen no reason to go against the woman's wishes and show Garrus the letter. But now...? She wasn't sure it was a good idea, she wasn't sure it would help matters any, but she downloaded a copy onto a datapad anyway. Pad in hand, she rose from her desk and summoned the elevator.

The SR-2's elevator was much faster than the old one on the SR-1, something Shepard was usually grateful for. As she paced the confines of the lift, however, she found herself wishing it would slow down. That would give her more time to plan. Not that she expected to walk into a firefight (verbal or otherwise) but she never did anything without some sort of plan. "Go down and force Garrus to talk," was her plan, and how she wished it was more substantial than that.

The elevator open and she stepped out, donning the "Commander Shepard" persona immediately and walking with purpose towards the forward battery. She didn't want anyone interrupting her with trifles before she got there. Between her gait and the seriousness of her demeanor, no one did. Shepard hit the holo panel on the door leading to the main battery and it swished open with its customary sound.

"Garrus, we need to talk," she said as she stepped in and the door closed behind her.

"Can it wait? I'm in the middle of some calibrations," the turian replied, his tone suggesting his annoyance and the fact that he didn't turn around confirming it.

"No, no it can't."

She stood there, arms crossed in front of her, waiting for him to respond. Slowly, Garrus straightened up and turned towards her.

"Commander, whatever it is you have to say, I'm pretty sure I don't want to hear it—" he began, but Shepard cut him off.

"It's not about what I have to say, Garrus," she fired back. "It's about whatever the hell it is that you need to say to me. You're hacked off at me and I can't say I blame you. So let me have it."

Shepard moved over to the empty workbench by EDI's terminal and planted herself against it, arms crossed in front of her, bracing for the turian's reply. Judging by the agitation evident in his body language and the way he stalked back and forth in front of his console, she was going to need to be braced.

"Commander, what in the hell were you doing?" Garrus growled, finally rounding on her, anger coloring both his words and the odd subharmonic tones of his voice. "What the fuck were you thinking, trying to spare that piece of shit? You saw the body count he left in his wake, you know what he did to me!" He fell silent, breathing through his nose, mandibles pressed tight against his jaw. "Why?" he growled at last, anger and hurt and accusation mixing in his voice, visible in the sharpness of his gaze.

There it was, at last, out in the open. Shepard found she didn't have the words to answer him, not right away.

"Because summary executions have never sat well with me," she replied quietly, meeting his eyes and not looking away.

"Bullshit!" Garrus snarled. "Balak, over Terra Nova! That asari running Saren's lab on Virmire! You gunned them both down without a second thought!" he snapped, jabbing an accusatory finger at her.

Shepard fought to keep her own emotions in check before she responded. "Balak managed to get a goddamn _platoon_ of batarian nut jobs, varren, and fucking _heavy weapons_ deep into Alliance space. You honestly think he didn't have the connections to weasel—or break—his way out of Alliance custody? I took the guaranteed option," she replied, keeping her voice even. "And if you somehow think that I didn't want to arrest Rana Thanoptis and make damn sure she spent the rest of her millennium-long lifespan behind bars, that rocket hit you harder than I thought." Her eyes narrowed. "We were in the middle of a fucking war zone on a high-risk operation with fuck all for backup and zero margin for error. Taking prisoners was not an option." Her gaze hardened and she put a little steel into her voice. "You had options. You had choices. I wanted you to see them."

"'Choices'?" he echoed, angry and incredulous. "My choices were to blow that son of a bitch's head off or to let a traitorous coward walk!"

"I know!" exclaimed Shepard, exasperated. They had been over this during the fight through Harkin's warehouse, in the sky car on the way to Orbital Lounge. Garrus' black and white view of his options was painfully clear from the start. "Part of me was hoping you wouldn't murder a man in broad daylight in front of dozens of witnesses. Was that really so damn wrong?"

That seemed to bring Garrus up short, at least for a moment. "Murder?" he spat back at her, incredulity mixed with anger in equal parts. "I brought that son of a bitch to justice! An eye for an eye, a life for a life, commander, and that bastard owed me ten times over!" He jabbed a finger at her. "Don't you _dare_ judge me for that, not when that was your justification for getting those hostages killed over Terra Nova. Lie to yourself if you want, but not to my face, and not when you're trying to take the moral high ground and judge me for what I've done!" His mandibles opened, closed, and opened again before he brought them tight against his jaw and began pacing. He still looked angry, his body language reminiscent of a caged predator on show at a zoo. The battery was silent except for the sound of his booted feet hitting the decking for a while before the turian turned back to her. "I'm no murderer. Sidonis was a murderer and I brought the fucker to justice the only way I could. You think your pal Aria T'loak gives a vorcha's ass about justice? Do you think the long arm of C-Sec stretches all the way to Omega? She doesn't, and C-Sec has fuck all for authority outside of Council Space," Garrus continued. "I told you in the car: I'm not you," he said, still angry, but he hadn't snarled the words this time. "Sparing him or killing him...either way, it wasn't your call to make."

Shepard let him rant. He needed to work it out of his system, and she damn well knew she'd had this coming when she realized how much she'd screwed up by trying to talk to Sidonis. As Garrus' temper and his words wound themselves down, she nodded. "I know. That's why I got out of your way, Garrus."

Garrus stopped pacing and leaned up against his control console, crossing his arms in front of him and looking at her. There was still anger in his eyes, she could see that, but not like before. She hoped that meant she'd made progress in breaking down that wall this thing with Sidonis had erected between them. "Damn well took you long enough, Shepard," he said after a long silence.

That was the first time since the shooting he'd used her name. She decided to take that as a good sign. "So...are we good, Garrus?" she asked, a bit more hesitant than she'd wanted to sound.

The turian shook his head. "Not yet...but we're closer to good than when you came in here."

Shepard bit back a sigh and nodded. "Well, I didn't think I could patch things up with a few words...but I was hoping. You're still the only friend I've got on this ship, Garrus. I don't want to lose you."

"You won't, Shepard," he said, almost reflexively it seemed. "I just...need some time to get my head together, process what happened."

"I can respect that," Shepard replied with a nod. "Before I go, though," she began, moving from her spot against the spare workbench, datapad in hand. "Now that your men are resting easy...here." She extended it to him.

"What's this?" he asked as he took it.

"It's a letter I got from your X.O.'s widow," Shepard replied. "She didn't want me to share it...but it seemed like something you needed to see, especially now. I don't know how turians grieve, Garrus, but I do know you need to stop beating yourself up over their deaths. I hope it helps." She turned and headed for the door.

"Shepard..."

She turned back to him, standing in the doorway. "Yeah Garrus?"

"I...thank you, for helping me out with Sidonis. I don't think I could have gotten to Harkin without you."

She flashed him a small smile. "What's that you're always telling me, Garrus? 'I'll be here if you need me?'" Shepard hesitated, then stepped back into the forward battery and let the door hiss closed behind her. "I mean that, Garrus. Like I said, I don't know how you turians handle losses...but if you need someone to talk to, or a shoulder, or something...well, you know where to find me."

That caught him by surprise. She could tell by the way his mandibles opened and the subtle shift in his body language. Likely Garrus was trying to square still being angry at her with her offer of aid. "Shepard, this is a little different than losing Ash on Virmire..." he said after a long pause.

_Or not…_ she thought as the turian responded with something that made little sense. _Or did he really think I held off all those bastards on Elysium single-handed...?_ "Elysium, Garrus," she began. "I'm the Hero of the Blitz because I led the holding action despite being on shore leave, not because I'm the only one who fought in it," she said quietly. "They weren't good friends, the way your squad was. Just soldiers and volunteers and cops trying to protect their homes and loved ones. I was a ranking Alliance officer and they looked to me for guidance." She sighed. "I know it's not the same as having your friends betrayed and murdered by a Judas in your midst, but I still watched a lot of people who trusted me die that day..." Her voice trailed off and she shrugged. "Like I said, Garrus, if you need me, I'm here for you, okay?"

It took Garrus a while to process what she'd said. "Thanks, Shepard," he replied after an awkward silence had descended between them. "I'll keep that in mind."

"I'll get out of your hair, let you get back to your calibrations."

"Shepard, the word you're looking for is 'fringe.'"

The door to the battery hissed open and Shepard stepped out, laughing lightly. That was the first quip she'd heard from Garrus in a week and it was surprising how good it felt to laugh at something so stupid. _No, not good. Right._ She'd put a hole in their friendship but not killed it, and now that she'd lanced the wound, it could recover. The conversation hadn't gone exactly as she'd hoped, but it certainly could have turned out worse. She allowed herself a small smile as she made her way back towards the elevator.

* * *

Author's Note: Sidonis...where to begin... I really, honestly, do not understand how Garrus could possibly count Shepard as a friend (let alone love interest) after Paragoning him out of popping Sidonis' head like a grape. Maybe if there had been some follow-up scene in the game, like for the Legion/Tali and Jack/Miranda missions, it would make sense. Maybe. In custody or not, there is no way Garrus would so easily forget Sidonis if he hunted down Saleon for (mostly) wounding his pride. Given what Sidonis had done to him, I was amazed at not losing his loyalty that first (and only) time I spared Sidonis. I do tend to talk and meddle first, though. Something about Sidonis' resignation to Garrus' bullet in that last dialogue option where you can Paragon Garrus out of taking the shot or (finally) get out of the way and let Garrus have his revenge:

S: "No more sleepless nights."

G: "For either of us, Sidonis."

As for Elysium, the description of the "War Hero" background in "Mass Effect" is as follows (emphasis mine):

"Early in your military career you found yourself facing an overwhelming enemy force. You risked your own life to save your fellow soldiers and defeat the enemy despite the impossible odds. Your bravery and heroism have earned you medals and recognition from the Alliance fleet. _**The War Hero **_**almost**_** single-handedly repelled an attack by batarian slavers on Elysium.**_" (Thank you, Mass Effect Wiki! wiki/Commander_Shepard )

You don't hold off attacks "almost single-handedly" without help and the fact that everyone makes such a big deal out of Shepard's actions on Elysium with this background suggests (to me, at least) that the legend grew with the telling as it were, and as we know from the end of "Mass Effect", you can't save everyone.

Anyway, thank you to everyone who's reading this and faving it or adding it to your watch list. I'm glad you're enjoying the story. :)

Extra special thank you to everyone who's been kind enough to throw a review my way, too! :) They are very much appreciated. :)


	7. Chapter 7: Grief

Grief

There was an old saying, _"speak of the devil and he will appear."_ Given Shepard's conversation with Garrus from a few days ago, she couldn't help but think that it was strangely appropriate to her situation. Another nightmare had chased her from her quarters to the crew deck, this time of Elysium. The scar that should have crossed her nose and cheek—the one she'd earned from a batarian bayonet, and one of the many Cerberus had decided to erase from her body when they resurrected her—burned as she leaned against the wall of the elevator. Tired as she was, she didn't close her eyes as the elevator descended. The dream was still fresh enough that she knew she'd see the faces of the dead behind her eyelids. Shepard suppressed a shudder as the elevator opened, the smell of smoke sharp in her nostrils and phantom pain from long-healed injuries burning her.

At this hour ('zero-dark-early,' Jenkins had been fond of calling it), the crew deck was deserted. Day shift was bunked down for the night, while night shift was busy in the CIC and engineering. Only Mordin was likely to be up at this hour, on account of the salarian needing so little sleep. According to him, he was embarrassed that he had to make such a concession to old age as to sleep for an hour and a half to two hours each night. It was a 'problem' Shepard could only shake her head at. There was also a chance Garrus might be up, chased from his bunk by his own demons. They'd run into each other a few times since that first night. Shepard seemed to have the advantage over him in the realm of dreams: he was always chased out of bed by Omega, whereas she could be chased out of bed for any number of reasons and not merely the destruction of the SR-1. She wasn't sure she could take having the same nightmare over and over and stay sane, and she found herself wondering how Garrus was holding it all together. Admittedly, she knew fuck all about psychology—let alone xenopsychology—but Garrus' reactions could be so…well…_human_.

Stifling a yawn, Shepard keyed the holopanel on the door to the lounge and stepped inside. The lights were down low but not off, consistent with normal night-cycle illumination, and things appeared empty at first glance. She turned to the bar and saw Garrus seated with his back to her, leaning over the countertop. From her angle, Shepard couldn't tell what he was drinking. She stopped short; the two had not commiserated over alcohol since the mess she'd made of Garrus' hunt for justice for his squad. He didn't seem to have noticed her arrival, either.

"Rough night for you too, huh Garrus?" she asked. "Mind if I join you?"

The turian turned towards her, his movements more awkward than she could ever recall seeing before. Shepard had never seen a smashed turian before, but somehow she knew Garrus was smashed—or near enough to make no difference. "Shepard," he slurred, mandibles drooping away from his mouth oddly. "Sure, c'mon, haff a shit…I mean…sit…I mean…seat. Fuck…" He shook his head as though trying to clear it and huffed a laugh.

Shepard made her way over to the bar and planted herself in the stool next to Garrus, forgoing the usual search through the cabinet for something to drink. She had never seen Garrus drunk like this and she was worried. "Going at it pretty hard, I see," she said, gesturing at the bottle. It looked to be half-gone, and she wondered how long Garrus had been in here.

The turian nodded. "Yeah. I was…I was…drinking t' my squad, see. Since…well…none of them are here, I had to…to drink for them. But it'd be rude to toast them and not drink, so…well…nothing for it but to drink with them, too, right? So I'd drink for Butler, and Butler would drink for me," he said, trying to explain, taking pulls from the bottle—he'd apparently skipped glasses and gone straight for the very green bottle of liquor under the counter—at appropriate moments. "I'd go through every one of my guys—well, except Sidonis, 'cause fuck him, right? Take a drink for them, then take a drink with them. It was a nice cycle, but then that clumsy krogan bastard Krul broke his glass. …or was it my glass? Ah, fuck, not like it matters, right?" He looked at her, blinking suddenly, as though he'd just noticed her presence. "You don't have…you should have…join me, drink to my squad, Shepard," he spluttered, then extended the bottle to her. He jerked it back an instant later, chuckling drunkenly. "Dextro-booze is bad for humans, sorry, sorry…here, lemme get something from the bar for you—"

As he tried to rise, Shepard moved with him and put a restraining hand on his shoulder. "Garrus, sit down before you fall down," she said, a smirk playing at the corner of her mouth. "You're drunk."

Garrus' mandibles opened wide in shock and his jaw dropped ever so slightly. Shepard couldn't be sure, but it seemed the turian was scandalized by her accusation. "Well…well…oh fuck yes, I am drunk!" he finally spluttered, then broke out in a fit of drunken turian laughter. The fit took so much out of him that by the end of it he was leaning on the bar with his elbows to keep himself propped up. "I figured…I figured…well, fuck, it worked for the vagrants we hauled in when I was a C-Sec rookie, so it should work for me, too..."

"Garrus…?"

He leaned over towards her, wobbling a bit before regaining his balance on the bar stool, and Shepard found herself leaning over to meet him. The pungent vapors of turian alcohol at this range stung her nose and eyes. "Lemme ask you a question, Shepard," he slurred. "How much more do you think I'll have to drink to forget? I keep looking at the bar and seeing myself. I don't wanna see me right now, Shepard. I close my eyes to not see myself, and…" His voice broke. She'd never heard any turian sound the way Garrus sounded now, the flanging effect of his voice suddenly discordant and lacking the usual melodic undertones it added to his words. Somehow, she knew that if Garrus were human, right now he'd be on the verge of tears. "All I see's…them," he choked, voice barely above a whisper. "Every last one of their faces…screaming…bleeding…dying. I don't want to see them anymore, Shepard!"

With that, the last support in the dam holding back Garrus' emotions shattered. He slumped forward onto the bar, clutching his forehead with one hand and the bottle in the other. Shepard had never seen a turian cry, and she didn't see Garrus crying now. No tear ducts, apparently, as his face remained dry. His shoulders didn't shake as sobs wracked his frame. No, Garrus gave voice to his misery with a keening, wordless lament that cut through her to the core. The souls of the damned had nothing on a grief-stricken, guilt-wracked turian.

Shepard sat frozen for an instant, uncertain whether she should do what instinct was telling her to do. _To hell with it._ Were Garrus human, she'd have thrown an arm over his shoulders and embraced him, and that is in fact what her first instinct was. However, that humped back of his made such an act impossible for her. Shepard checked her arm, then lowered it to embrace him at the waist, holding him close. With her free hand, she gently pried the bottle away from his numbed fingers and took his hand in hers. If Garrus was shocked or appalled by her sudden proximity or her embrace, he gave no sign of it. She took it to mean either he was too drunk to care, or that turians had similar reactions to hearing someone in such great distress. Shepard said nothing, knowing that this was not the time for empty platitudes or reassurances. Garrus needed someone to lean on, and she could do that for him.

Eventually, much to Shepard's relief, Garrus quieted, though this turned out to be a mixed blessing, as the turian had passed out in her arms. "Hey, Garrus, wake up," she hissed. No reaction. She tried to jostle him awake, but he slept on. She looked at the bottle again, heaving a frustrated sigh at the sight of how low it was. Given what he'd consumed, the turian was probably not going to be waking any time soon. Carefully, she let go her hold on Garrus and leaned him onto the bar to snooze for a few moments, considering her options. She was not going to leave him perched on that bar stool, so she had three choices: cart him over to the med bay and see if Mordin was up and about yet, deposit him on a couch here and keep watch herself, or lug him back to his bunk and hope he didn't have any side effects worse than the standard hangover—whatever a turian hangover might be.

She didn't know if choking on one's own vomit was even possible for passed out, drunken, turians—or if they even possessed the capacity to vomit. _Right, not lugging him to his bunk without knowing if he'll wake up again in the morning…_ That left keeping watch over him herself, or calling an expert. Cerberus upgrades or no, Shepard knew she couldn't keep herself awake the entire night and was afraid that if she nodded off, it would be at just the wrong moment. She also wasn't sure she could manhandle Garrus without someone's help. Dr. Chakwas would be asleep at this hour and Shepard would feel guilty for summoning her from bed for something like this—not to mention, she was not the sort of person well-suited to manhandling patients anymore. That left Mordin, and the salarian might actually be awake at this hour given his bizarre sleeping habits.

"EDI, is Mordin in his lab?"

"Yes, Shepard," EDI answered, her pawn-shaped avatar springing to life by the lounge door. "Professor Solus is continuing his analysis of seeker swarm telemetry data from Horizon in an effort to improve the effectiveness of his countermeasures. Shall I contact him for you?"

"No thanks, EDI," Shepard answered with a shake of her head. "Lock the lounge door until Mordin or myself tell you otherwise, please."

"Very well, Shepard," she replied, the holopanel on the door glowing red. "Logging you out."

As EDI's avatar winked back out, Shepard triggered her omni-tool, activating its vidcomm feature. "Mordin, sorry to interrupt, but I could use your help down here in the lounge."

"Shepard. Surprised to see you awake at this hour. Later than I thought?"

She shook her head, grinning a little. "No, it's early enough that the only people up are night crew and yourself," she replied. "Short version: I came down for a nightcap and found Garrus in here and going at it hard," she began, shifting the omni-tool so that the vidscreen showed Mordin the unconscious turian's back. "He's out like a light and I could use some help getting him over to the med bay."

Mordin closed his eyes and inhaled sharply through his nose, then shook his head. "Thought Vakarian knew his limits. Behavior unexpected. Will be down momentarily, Shepard." The vidcomm winked out.

_Yeah, so did I…_ she thought as she closed down her omni-tool. Carefully, she prodded Garrus' shoulder and tried to wake him up, wanting to spare him the indignity of being slung between herself and Mordin and hauled to the med bay like a sack of grain. The turian, however, was dead to the world. "Damn it, Garrus…" she sighed. Moving in behind him, she wrapped her arms around his torso under his own and lifted him free of the bar stool. It toppled to the floor with a bang as she lugged the unconscious turian over to the couch and carefully laid him down on it, trying to be careful of his fringe and the spurs on the backs of his calves. She'd never seen that fringe of his flex and didn't want to injure it; same for those spurs. Laid out like this, it would be easier for the Mordin to help her get him to the med bay.

Cerberus upgrades or no, Shepard was glad to hear the door open and see Mordin step through; Garrus was heavier than he looked, and he'd never seemed terribly dainty to Shepard. He was down the steps and next to the couch in an instant, omni-tool active as he took a few brief scans of Garrus. "Vital signs consistent with alcohol-induced sleep. Probably not poisoned, but always better to be cautious," he declared, moving towards Garrus' torso. "Shepard, grab legs at knees, be careful of spurs. More fragile than they appear."

Nodding, she did as Mordin directed and the two heaved Garrus off the couch on a three-count. The trip to the med bay was mercifully free of any interruptions by Cerberus crew, and Shepard had EDI activate the med bay's privacy screens the moment they were in. As an afterthought, she made sure to end the lockdown she'd put on the lounge door as well, only to discover that EDI had taken the initiative and done it herself. They deposited Garrus on one of the beds, with Shepard propping up Garrus' head while Mordin secured some extra pillows to put into the gap between the back of his neck and fringe. "Hangover headache will be bad enough, no need to add insult to injury with sore neck," he'd said.

She draped one of the hospital blankets over him, feeling distinctly ridiculous at the notion of tucking her friend in like this and simultaneously resolving to never bring it up. It would have been funny, save for the reason he was in this state at all. While she did that, Mordin took a few more scans with his omni-tool.

"Sorry to pull you away from your work, Mordin," Shepard said. "Xenobiology isn't my strong suit, and I know alcohol poisoning can be fatal to humans…better safe than sorry, right?"

"Concerns understandable, Shepard," replied the salarian. He turned to face her. "Alcohol a common sleep aid for all species, but self-medication…problematic," he continued, scrutinizing her, apparently waiting for her to respond.

Shepard rolled her eyes just a little and sighed. "If you've got something to say, Mordin, go ahead and say it."

"Not psychologist, not qualified to speak on mental health issues," he began, raising a placating hand. It seemed to Shepard that he was offering a disclaimer—his permission to take his opinion with a grain of salt. "However, aware that both yourself and Garrus have…self-medicated…several times." Mordin inhaled sharply through his nose before continuing. "Given recent traumas, actions understandable. However," Mordin paused and gestured at Garrus. "Such treatment modalities hazardous without supervision." The salarian inhaled sharply again. "Cannot treat underlying causes, but can help manage physical symptoms. Can offer less…side-effect rich…sleep aids, if desired."

"…wait, how the hell did you know we'd been hitting the bottle?" Shepard asked, concerned about how Mordin even knew that she and Garrus both had taken to drinking down their nightmares. She had felt secure in the knowledge that it was their dark secret that nobody else knew.

"I felt it prudent to alert Dr. Chakwas and Professor Solus to this development, Commander," stated EDI, her avatar springing to life from the podium near the door to med bay.

Shepard whirled on the AI, suddenly terrified at the thought of the Illusive Man knowing about the bad nights and the dreams that chased the two of them from their beds at times. "I suppose now your boss with the freaky eyes knows, too, now. Why the hell—"

For a change, EDI cut Shepard off. "I do possess some degree of operational autonomy, Commander," she interrupted. "Until such time as your or Officer Vakarian's condition serves to impair the Normandy's mission, the Illusive Man does not need to know about your late-night visits to the port side lounge." With that, she winked back out.

_Great, I've got an AI covering for me…_ It was a less than ideal situation all around, but there was nothing to be done about it. With a sigh, Shepard ran a hand through her hair. At least nobody was demanding she speak to a shrink. "Sure, Mordin…hit me with a tranq. Might as well get some sleep tonight…"

The corners of Mordin's mouth twitched up in a brief smile. "Of course Shepard. But here, in med bay?"

She nodded. "I'll probably be up before Garrus; I can try and fool him into thinking we both had too much to drink when he comes around. Whether he believes me or not…well…I want to talk to him anyway."

Mordin seemed to consider her plan before shrugging and nodding. "As you wish, Shepard. Lie down."

Shepard took a seat on the empty bed next to the one they'd laid Garrus out in, stretching out and stifling a yawn with the back of her hand. Mordin was hovering over her an instant later, flicking a syringe. "Sleep well, Shepard," he said. She felt the needle prick the inside of her elbow. It wasn't much longer before she wasn't feeling anything at all.

Shepard woke to find that day shift had started, the med bay's lights up to their normal level of illumination and Dr. Chakwas at her desk as usual. Garrus was asleep and…snoring? Unlike human snoring, his was actually somehow pleasant, influenced by whatever structures in the turian throat added that distinctive flanging effect to their voices. Listening to him snore, it sounded almost melodic somehow.

"Commander. I understand you and Mr. Vakarian had a bit of a rough night," said Chakwas, rising from her seat.

Shepard shook her head. "No, just Garrus," she replied. "But once he comes to, as far as you are concerned, we _**both**_ got shitfaced last night, okay? I'm fine because…Cerberus. Upgrades heal me quicker, I figure they'd help me get over a hangover faster too."

"No wonder I couldn't match you when we shared that bottle of Serrice ice brandy," the doctor replied, smirking. "I should have guessed your modifications gave you an unfair advantage in a drinking contest." Her tone and expression turned serious. "May I inquire why you are so adamant that I assist you in establishing the fiction that Garrus was not the only one incapacitated by excess drink?"

Shepard sighed. "If he remembers last night, then he'll remember I saw him in a place he probably wished nobody had ever seen him enter, doctor," she replied. "I'd rather let him believe I don't remember last night; God knows I'd never want a friend to remember seeing me in the state he was in last night, let alone a C.O."

"I suppose I can appreciate that sentiment," Chakwas replied. "But what if he doesn't fall for it? He was a C-Sec detective for years, you know."

Shepard sighed and shrugged. "There you go again, disrupting my ideas with logic…" she replied. "If he doesn't buy it..." She shrugged again. "I wanted to talk to him anyway. Seeing him like that…well, it worries me." She sighed and looked at Chakwas.

"You seem to be waiting on me to say something, Commander."

"It's more that I'm wondering why you haven't rapped my knuckles since EDI tattled on me."

Chakwas smiled just a little. "Commander, I have learned that—with you in particular—pushing is of little help. I trusted that you would speak with me in due time and only if you felt it was necessary. I suspected I would have similar luck with Garrus and have not spoken with him, either," she explained. "So…now that you know your secret is out, will you accept my help? If only for a good night's sleep?"

"I may just have to take you up on that offer, doctor," Shepared replied. "Thank you."

"Thanks are hardly necessary; it's part of my job," Doctor Chakwas countered, smiling. She was about to continue but paused and pointed at Garrus. "It would appear that our turian friend is waking up. EDI, please dim the lights to three-quarters full illumination." EDI's response was simply dimming the lights a little; such a simple command didn't warrant voice acknowledgement. "I'll take care of your prescription, Commander."

Shepard had to admire the doctor's ability to make a discrete exit without looking like she was deliberately giving the two of them as much privacy as the med bay allowed. "Welcome back to the land of the conscious, Garrus," she said softly. She was unsure what turian hangovers were like but thought it best to keep her voice down, just in case.

Garrus' response was an odd, warbling moan. He raised a hand to shield his eyes from the lights, even though Dr. Chakwas had asked EDI to dim them. "…Shepard?" he groaned, sounding hoarse. She offered him some water, which he was all too happy to gulp down. "…fuck…by the pounding I feel everywhere, I'm guessing I overdid it last night…" He let out another moan, blinking a few times to try and get his eyes used to the light. The turian looked at her as though seeing her for the first time, mandibles slightly askew and eyes trying to focus on her. "You don't look too bad, considering…" He paused. "…wait…you didn't have anything to drink, did you? And I had…oh…fuck…"

_Well, so much for that idea… _"Considering what you consumed, Garrus, I'm surprised you remember that much of last night…" Shepard replied, offering him some more water. "Most humans with that much booze in them tend to kill enough brain cells to erase parts of the evening." She smirked. "Or all of it, if the conditions are right…"

"Sounds like you've had some personal experience with that, Shepard," Garrus said between sips. "Ever make a complete ass of yourself in front of your commanding officer before?"

Shepard frowned at him and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Hey, that's not what happened last night, Garrus."

"I'm pretty sure you're remembering it all wrong, Shepard—"

She cut him off; the last thing she wanted was for him to feel guilty for his grief. "No, I'm remembering a grief-stricken friend drowning his sorrows in drink in the hopes of being able to sleep." The commander sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose between thumb and forefinger before continuing. "Jesus Christ almighty, Garrus, maybe it's humiliating for turians to crack like that in front of someone they respect, but we are friends, are we not? I don't know how grief works for your people, Garrus, but among humans, friends try and shoulder the burden," she said, her tone of voice harsher than she had wanted it to be.

The turian gulped down the last of his water and lay back onto the bed. The silence stretched between them for several moments as Garrus appeared to try and find something to say. "I'm sorry, Shepard," he said at last, closing his eyes. "I thought…I thought taking Sidonis down would fix everything…" He paused, searching for words again. "But…"

"But you've been running on hate since I found you in your hideout on Omega, haven't you?" she asked quietly. "And now that the hate is gone, everything else you would have felt after such a loss has come boiling back to the surface."

Garrus nodded once, the motion ever so subtle. "Since when did you get so insightful, Shepard?" he asked, mandibles flicking open in a half-hearted turian grin.

"There's this wiseass former C-Sec detective I'm acquainted with." A faint smirk crossed her lips. "I know a thing or two about grief and how to dodge it, Garrus," she replied. "And I also know you can't dodge it forever."

"A fact I was reminded of again last night, Shepard," the turian murmured in agreement.

Shepard patted Garrus' shoulder, smiling faintly. "Garrus, I know you don't want to abandon the mission…but I also know how grief can fuck with a person's head. You say the word and I'll have Joker set course for the nearest turian colony, or the Citadel, and you're free from whatever obligation you feel you owe me."

His eyes flew open, mandibles fluttering against the sides of his face, and Shepard guessed she had said exactly the wrong thing. "Shepard, what the fuck are you saying? You _want_ me to leave? Do you think I'm not fit for duty or something?" He sounded both angry and horrified.

"I don't want to lose you, Garrus," she replied. "I don't want you to leave, but I don't want you getting yourself killed on this little crusade of mine because your head isn't in the game." Sighing, Shepard ran a hand through her hair. "Garrus, I know you're torn up inside over what happened, and I know that stitching all the pieces back together takes time—time we don't have while the Collectors are dancing around the Terminus Systems abducting entire colonies. Do you follow me?"

The sound he made had to be the turian equivalent of a snort. "Look who's talking, Shepard. Last I looked…well…" he left the rest of his sentence hanging, unspoken, in the air between them.

"You have the advantage of not being Commander fucking Shepard, savior of the Citadel, first human Spectre, blah blah blah fucking blah," Shepard replied, grimacing. "I can't walk away from this."

"Then I guess I can't either, Shepard," he said, turning towards her and locking his eyes with hers. "You're the only reason I'm here to grieve my squad, Shepard—the only reason they and their families got some measure of the justice the galaxy owed them. Come hell, or Collectors, or Reapers, or whatever else the galaxy will throw at you, I'm with you, Shepard," he said, the quiet fierceness in his voice manifesting in the hardness of his eyes and the subharmonic tones of his voice.

Smiling, Shepard patted his shoulder again. "I know that, Garrus," she replied. "That means…shit that means a lot. I just wanted to make sure, give you an out if you wanted it," she said. "But…"

"…No more passing out drunk at the bar in the lounge?" Garrus offered as the pause stretched to awkward silence.

"Among other things," she said with a smirk. "Courtesy of our Cerberus AI, Mordin and Chakwas know about our fondness for drinking the nightmares away," Shepard explained, her expression and tone sobering.

"Shit."

"My thoughts exactly," Shepard agreed with a nod of her head. "Good news is, EDI claims she hasn't passed this along to the Illusive Man…yet. She will if it starts to interfere with the mission."

"So I shouldn't do what I did last night regularly?" Garrus asked, mandibles spreading in a grin. "Having been reminded of just how spirits-awful a hangover after a night like that is…"

"Garrus, Mordin and Chakwas have offered to help," she replied. "Sleeping pills. It's band-aid over a much larger problem, but at least they should keep the nightmares at bay."

"…so swallow my pride and do as the doctors order?"

"You and me both, Garrus."

The turian rolled over onto his back once more and nodded. "I can do that, Shepard."

She smiled again. "Good. And you can do one more thing for me: you're relieved of duty for the next couple days. Take it easy, sleep off the hangover—or whatever it is you turians do."

Garrus turned back towards her, looking like he was going to protest, but checked himself at the last minute. "Okay, Shepard," he said with a sigh, sounding defeated. "I don't like it, but I'll do it."

"The forward batteries will still be there waiting, Garrus."

"You won't let anyone mess with my calibration algorithms, right?"

* * *

Author's Note: Again with the long wait in between updates. Sorry folks. Hopefully the length kind of makes up for things. I also realized I've broken my pattern of alternating chapters between Garrus' and Shepard's P.O.V.'s with this chapter and the last one, but oh well. These both needed to be from Shepard's point of view. Garrus will serve as our window into the "Mass Effect" universe next chapter, promise. :)

Garrus and Shepard are both badasses of the first order, but I find it hard to believe that they are immune to the effects their bloody and violent pasts tend to have on other people who experience such things. I also have hopefully not approached what I know to be a sensitive topic in a flippant or dismissive manner. Treatment takes time, time the games do not let either of them have-except maybe Shepard during her six-month stint under house arrest between "Mass Effect 2" and "Mass Effect 3", and even then I doubt that's anywhere near enough time to make headway with the problem.

As ever, thank you for reading and even more so thank you for reviewing. :) Next chapter should be a little lighter in tone and content, I hope.


	8. Chapter 8: Bringer of War

Bringer of War

"—arrus!"

He woke slowly, head foggy despite the stims he could feel coursing through his system. _Ah, pain…my old friend… _The turian took stock of his situation as his brain slowly rebooted. Hands, fingers, and arms were still intact and uninjured beyond a few flesh wounds he'd taken as they began their escape. _Good sign, good sign… _Moving his legs and feet was possible—agonizing, but possible. His legs were on fire from the knees down, or had been recently, if he was any judge. Both shins had dead spots where things felt completely numb. To either side of those dead zones, all was pain as his nerves shrieked at him about how badly he'd been burned. _Bad sign…can't feel everything…_ Alarms blared at him from his visor about blown shield capacitors and barely-functional emergency armor seals. _At least they're in place and working…hard to breathe vacuum…_ He looked up to see Shepard's eyes locked with his through the faceplate of her helmet. Now he remembered.

Shepard had ordered him to keep the husks and drones off them while she and Grunt tackled the Praetorian. He'd popped concussive shots at the floating abomination when the opportunity presented itself but had, as ordered, focused on the infantry. He'd missed a shot on a Collector that had flanked him, flushing him from cover with the help of a pair of husks. Garrus had flattened the Collector with a concussive round, then disengaged to sprint for another barricade…and run straight into the Praetorian. Its energy weapon had drained his shields precipitously before he'd thrown himself forward in a desperate bid to find cover. Looking around, he saw he hadn't been so lucky. _Well, that at least explains the pain…_

"Jesus H. Christ on a goddamn stick, Garrus, what part of 'you don't get to die on me' does not compute?" Shepard demanded, her tone a mix of exasperation and relief. Though he couldn't read her expression, Garrus thought she would probably be smiling that smile of hers. It was a uniquely Shepard smile, one she wore whenever something that shouldn't possibly have worked actually did and everyone was still alive to tell the tale. _Like killing Sovereign… _His visor's vital monitors showed elevated heart rate and adrenaline levels, more so than normal even for Shepard after a tough fight.

"Sorry, Shepard," he offered weakly. "But it's not my fault you were so fucking slow dropping that Praetorian," he quipped. Her body tensed as she drew back a fist to mock-punch him in the shoulder and the turian forced a laugh.

"We need to move, Shepard," rumbled Grunt, breaking the mood.

"Right," she answered, straightening up from where she'd been kneeling at Garrus' side to pump Medi-gel through his armor system.

The pain was fading, but Garrus had no illusions about his ability to move. "I'm not going anywhere, Shepard," he said. "I'll just slow you down. Leave me your rifle's spare clips and I'll cover your backs as long as I can."

"This isn't Virmire, Garrus. Nobody gets left behind," she snapped, an unfamiliar fierceness in her eyes and tone of voice.

"He can't walk, Shepard," growled the Krogan. "Do as he says."

She head-butted him in response, their helmets colliding so hard Garrus couldn't help but wince at the sound of impact. "Then you're going to give me your shotgun and carry him," she barked.

Grunt didn't move at first. "Yes, battlemaster," he rumbled after a moment or two, passing the massive Claymore to Shepard. She seemed dwarfed by the weapon's size, which amused Garrus since usually the shotgun seemed so small in Grunt's hands. Okeer's tank-bred knelt and picked Garrus up one-handed, leaving the turian's armored toes scraping at the decking of the Collector vessel. Grunt produced his Mattock with the other hand and nodded his readiness to Shepard.

Garrus couldn't help but think that trying to wield an assault rifle one-handed was doomed to failure. Still, the ease with which Grunt had hauled him up with one arm suggested the krogan had the necessary strength to deal with the rifle's kick, even wielding it one-handed. The turian drew his pistol with shaky hands, determined not to be completely useless—bad enough he was being hauled around by Grunt like this.

"Concussive rounds only," the turian promised, catching the look Shepard shot him from behind her visor.

"Right, because that makes me feel _so_ much safer…" she shot back wryly. "Surely humans aren't the only ones to figure out that 'friendly fire' is an oxymoron." Shaking her head, she turned and gave the Claymore a test fire, cursing colorfully at the massive shotgun's kickback. "All right people, let's move!"

Shepard suited actions to words, taking the lead with her shotgun at the ready as they beat a hasty retreat towards the waiting shuttle. EDI's voice served as a steady nav beacon in their helmet ear pieces, directing them through doors she was holding open and then sealing behind them. They made good time, all things considered, even if Garrus was fighting to bite back a yelp or growl of pain with most every step Grunt took. It couldn't last, of course.

They heard them before they saw them, the strange sound of the Collector drones' jump-jets announcing their imminent arrival. Garrus abruptly found himself sailing through the air to land in a crumpled, screaming heap on the deck (behind cover, as it turned out) as Grunt flung him down and readied his Mattock in both hands. By some miracle, Garrus had kept hold of his pistol after impact. He crawled on his stomach out around the edge of the bank of control consoles Grunt had tossed him behind and started lining up shots.

"Stay with him, Grunt!" she ordered, hefting the shotgun and chambering another round. "Both of you, Harbinger's puppets are priority one!"

With that, she was off, advancing on the swarming Collectors as Grunt and Garrus provided covering fire. The turian focused on flattening Collectors that tried to flank Shepard. He didn't always hit, but his concussive rounds were usually enough to cause them to hesitate. That, in turn, was enough for Shepard. She either shattered their skulls with the butt of the Claymore or reduced them to a fine mist of gore with a point-blank blast from the gun's muzzle. He'd never seen her fight like this before, as she tended to favor keeping the enemy at arm's length with an assault rifle or pistol. Now, as he watched her duck and weave between cover, the shotgun as much an extension of her as any other weapon he'd ever seen her use, he finally understood. This was why she was the Hero of the Blitz, the first human Spectre, slayer of Reapers, and unwilling instrument of Cerberus. She didn't hit every shot—nobody, not even him, did—but no movement was wasted. He watched her vitals spike as she triggered her combat implant liberally, her movements suddenly imbued with preternatural speed that let her catch a Collector drone on the move with the full force of the shotgun, or duck into cover before a Collector particle rifle could get a proper bead on her. Concussive shots, from any of the three of them, dropped other drones, giving Shepard a chance to reload or crush a drone skull under her boot. She ducked behind pillars and control banks to reload, trusting Garrus and Grunt to keep Collectors from flushing her from cover.

_**WE WILL DIRECT THIS PERSONALLY.**_

The sound grated against Garrus' ears, the voice instantly recognizable as the entity which called itself Harbinger. The turian didn't know whether Harbinger was the puppet-master for the Collectors or, as Shepard suspected, another Reaper, but the voice certainly possessed the same mix of disdain and contempt that he remembered so well from the conversation with Sovereign. Strangely, however, Harbinger seemed to lack the bored and annoyed undertones that had all but dripped from every word Sovereign spoke. He tried to line up his pistol for a concussive round while Harbinger was busy transforming his drone-puppet, but found himself cursing colorfully in turian and krogan when he realized the barrel was still cooling down from the last one.

"Grunt, hit him!" he shouted, forgetting his own promise to Shepard to only use concussive rounds and emptying most of a thermal clip at Harbinger. Garrus' visor registered a few hits but nowhere near enough to even draw the puppet's attention, let alone put a dent in its defenses.

"A little busy here!" grunted the krogan, and Garrus looked over to see him fighting hand-to-hand with a trio of husks. He dispatched them quickly enough, of course, laughing every time he sent one flying with a casual backhand…but the delay was long enough. Harbinger had assumed direct control and was advancing on Shepard, biotics flaring.

_**THE FORCES OF THE UNIVERSE BEND TO ME. YOU ARE BACTERIA.**_

A particle beam sliced through the air over Garrus' head as an assassin and three remaining drones moved to engage them and keep them from helping Shepard. Grunt's assault rifle hammered out a barrage of return fire, his shields sparking and spitting from repeated particle beam hits. One drone's head exploded in a shower of gore before the krogan was forced to crouch again and let his shields recharge. Mercifully, Garrus' pistol had finally cooled to the point where the secondary firing chamber was primed for another concussive round. He let it fly and watched with some satisfaction as Harbinger staggered ever so slightly from the impact. The puppet pulled back a fist and sent an all-too-familiar sphere of biotic power surging through the air in response, though it was directed at Shepard. She had ducked behind a row of control consoles to hammer a new thermal clip into the Claymore's chamber. Garrus knew from experience that her cover wouldn't save her from the effects of Harbinger's attack.

"Shepard, get out of there!" he yelled through his comms, peppering Harbinger with the rest of his pistol's clip. The rounds sparked off the thing's biotic barrier, weakening it further. _What was it Reegar said on Haestrom? Kill it with bug bites?_ he thought grimly as he scooted back behind cover to reload.

_**TURIAN; YOU ARE CONSIDERED…TOO PRIMITIVE.**_

Or he would have, had he not suddenly found himself engulfed in flames. Bug bites or not, Garrus had apparently pissed off Harbinger enough to decide he was worthy of being roasted. Garrus let out a choked, panicked scream as his shields melted under the assault, praying to whatever spirits might have been listening that his armor not catch fire again. He felt Grunt on him an instant later, though his efforts to put out the fire could better be described as 'pummeling' rather than 'patting'.

"Getting its attention…bad idea. For you."

Something about the tone of Grunt's voice made Garrus think of the little manic smile he got whenever he was about to kill something with his bare hands. Grunt's armor flashed as he triggered his shield boosters and rose from cover, firing a few bursts from his assault rifle at the other Collectors to force them to duck.

"**I AM KROGAAAAAN!**"

Garrus watched in disbelief as Grunt threw himself at Harbinger to buy Shepard time to find new cover and line up a shot with the Claymore. As familiar with the nature of friendly fire as Shepard was, Garrus reloaded his pistol and forced himself up into a crouch despite the agony in his legs, peppering the remaining Collectors. He would be honest with himself and admit that it was luck more than skill that sent a round through a drone's eye and out the back of its freakishly-shaped skull. A concussive round caught the last drone as it was in the process of vaulting a bank of controls, trying to flush him from cover. The shot hit it in the gut, doubling it over, while the force of impact lifted it up off its feet and slammed it back into the controls with bone-crunching force. It crumpled in a heap, back bent in a way not even a salarian would find survivable. Garrus pumped a few shots into its skull, just to make sure. His time exposed was enough for the Collector with the particle rifle to get him in its sights once more. Garrus' shields were cut in half before he managed to flop back down behind cover. His head was swimming from the pain he was in, the agony in his legs overwhelming medi-gel and adrenaline both. He blessed the spirits that he wasn't on his knees any further and prayed the pain would fade quickly as he popped a new thermal clip into his pistol and waited for his shields to recharge.

_**KROGAN; STERILIZED RACE, POTENTIAL WASTED. **_

Harbinger's contemptuous voice presaged a yell—less of triumph and more of pain—from Grunt, followed by a wild barrage of fire from his Mattock, and then the unmistakable sound of a fully-armored krogan hitting the deck. The sound of a rifle slipping from nerveless fingers to clatter on the deck followed shortly thereafter. _Get up, Grunt!_ Garrus willed. The krogan, however, made no further sound.

_**AND NOW YOU STAND ALONE, SHEPARD. FACE YOUR ANNIHILATION.**_

"Do you _ever_ fucking shut up?!" she exclaimed. The Claymore roared and Garrus heard the sound of her backpedaling away from Harbinger's slow relentless advance. The turian scrabbled forward, ignoring as best he could the pain in his legs, to peek out from behind his cover again. The last drone's energy weapon whined, catching Shepard in the back and making her shields flare before she could get in cover. Another of Harbinger's biotic attacks hit and her shields popped.

"_SHEPARD!_"

For one gut-wrenching, horrible instant, Garrus thought he was back on Omega, watching the last of his men fall to the mercenary assault. For awful one moment, he thought he was about to lose Shepard for a second time. Then the turian recognized the familiar weight of his pistol in his hands, spotted the glowing holographic icon denoting he'd activated his armor-piercing mod, and knew this wasn't Omega. Shepard wasn't going to die because he was here, not a million light-years away drowning in red tape on the bureaucratic hellhole of the Citadel. He was here, he was breathing, and he had thermal clips for his pistol.

Roaring his hate and defiance, Garrus forced himself back onto his knees. He braced his forearms on the bank of control consoles and poured fire into Harbinger.

Both Harbinger and the assassin turned towards him, the assassin shouldering its particle rifle as Harbinger drew back its fist, form rippling with biotic power. The particle rifle whined and Garrus' shields started to drain but the turian kept firing. Harbinger finished his wind-up, launching an all-too familiar black orb of biotic energy his way. Garrus kept firing. His visor started pinging at him as his shields reached critical levels, but the turian kept firing. Suddenly, he saw Shepard out of the corner of his eye, leaping from cover.

"Hey Harbinger!" she shouted, sprinting at him.

Focus shifted from Garrus to her and Garrus kept firing, his clip nearly spent now. Shepard closed to point-blank range, close enough to physically ram the barrel of the shotgun into the Collector-puppet's torso. The Claymore roared and bucked in Shepard's hands, and the light went out of the drone-puppet's eyes as its chest disappeared and the rest of it started to disintegrate.

_**THIS FORM IS IRRELEVANT. KILL ONE AND A HUNDRED WILL REPLACE IT.**_

"Like hell!"

Shepard turned her attention to the last Collector, popping off a concussive shot that sent it reeling as she dropped back into cover to reload the shotgun. Garrus dropped back behind his control consoles and slumped against them as he reached for another thermal clip for his pistol, his legs screaming at him even as he smiled faintly. One left, and if they finished it quickly enough, Harbinger couldn't take it over. He crawled forward and reached the corner of the bank of controls just in time to watch the last Collector's head explode from a point-blank blast of the Claymore.

Shepard turned towards him and gave him a thumbs-up, the old familiar hand-gesture meaning they'd taken care of all hostiles. She moved over to Grunt to trigger the tank-bred's armor medi-gel systems while Garrus sat, once again helpless, with his back to the bank of controls. Shepard was still alive. Grunt was conscious again after the medi-gel kicked in. There was still a chance they'd get out of this in one piece. Garrus' visor pinged softly at him, the tone immediately recognizable as the signal for incoming hostiles. He couldn't hear any jump-jets though, so what…?

"SCION!" bellowed Shepard.

Garrus peaked out from behind his cover just in time to catch Shepard and Grunt reel drunkenly away from the blast-wave of the lumbering monstrosity's cannon. Both had been hit and their shield emitters sparked and sputtered uselessly as the damping effect of the cannon blast played havoc with their shield generators. _To hell with this…_ thought Garrus as he saw just how few shots he had left with his pistol. He holstered it and produced his Mantis.

Groaning, he fought his way to his knees as the rifle expanded and set up on the bank of control consoles. It was less than ideal, all things considered, but he was pretty much out of options. Grunt and Shepard needed time for their hardsuit computers to scrub the junk code that had been introduced to fry their shields. They also needed covering fire. Garrus was the only member of the squad who could provide it.

The Mantis roared, the Scion staggered, and Garrus ducked to reload as the lumbering atrocity turned towards him. The turian rose back up onto his knees, fighting down the screaming agony in his legs, and lined up another shot as the Scion's bizarre arm cannon let loose. Garrus' shot hit home, but so did the Scion's biotic shockwave. The turian was hurled up and back, screaming, through the air as his shields failed. He felt the familiar bite of biotics tearing at him, trying to rip apart both his armor and himself. He hit the deck hard, the impact knocking the wind from his lungs and sending stars dancing across his field of vision as his head and fringe exploded with pain. Darkness nibbled at the edges of his vision. _Not like this...spirits, not like this...!_

He needn't have worried. Shepard's exclamation of, "God damn it, Vakarian, what did I just tell you?!" was punctuated by the hammering of Grunt's Mattock and then a roar from the Claymore as Shepard finished the horrific construct off. Garrus' vision cleared as the biotics tearing at him faded. He was gasping for breath by the time Shepard made her way over to him.

"One of these days I'm not going to be around to save your ass, Garrus," she chided. "What in hell were you thinking, sniping that fucking monster shot up like you are?"

"That saving your ass was probably in my best interests," he shot back, coughing. "Come on; let's get out of here before more drones show up."

Garrus collapsed his sniper rifle back to its portable form and slung it over his back, accepting a handful of fresh thermal clips for his pistol from Shepard. He reloaded and then nodded to Grunt. The krogan shifted his Mattock to a one-handed grip again and hauled Garrus up as effortlessly as he had following the firefight with the Praetorian. Shepard, Claymore in hand, took point as before.

"_Uh, commander? I hate to rush you, but those weapons are about to come on-line. Might want to double-time it; you know, so we can leave before they blow the Normandy in half."_

Joker's admonishment to hurry was followed swiftly by the raspy, moaning screams of husks. The motion tracker on Garrus' visor showed a small sea of red around the corner in the passageway ahead of them. He was surprised there weren't Collectors on them already, but it seemed to him that they had blown past the last of the easy ambush points on EDI's escape route. The husks were a last-ditch roadblock to allow Harbinger's puppets to catch them from behind.

"Grunt, stay with Garrus. Concussive rounds when they round the corner!" Shepard barked.

The husks that came surging around the corner were greeted by a barrage of concussive rounds from the three of them. Two disintegrated outright from the force of the blast, while a third was flung up and back to shatter and splatter on the ceiling. The remainder, unperturbed by the trio's opening volley, clambered forward.

"Go for the legs!" ordered Shepard as she positioned herself a good couple of meters ahead of Grunt and Garrus to draw the attention of the husks.

They were on her in seconds. The Claymore roared a greeting, spitting superheated buckshot into the nearest husk. The payload, modified by the incendiary mod the commander had activated, ignited her target and several of the other animated corpses near it. They let out a chorus of rasping shrieks as they burned, crumpling to smears of greasy ash on the decking seconds later. The rest came at her, a gibbering, barking, moaning horde. Shepard danced among them, the Claymore roaring as fast as she could reload. Garrus and Grunt fired freely into the mass that kept pouring around the corner, peppering them with rounds and concussive shots as often as they could reload and the secondary firing chamber cooled. Anything they couldn't finish off, they left to Shepard. Again and again the Claymore roared, spitting flaming metal. Finally, it was over. Garrus realized his hands were shaking even worse than before as he re-holstered his pistol. Despite the Medi-gel, shock was finally setting in.

"Let's go!" barked Shepard as she moved back towards them. She handed Grunt's Claymore back to him and produced her own Mattock. "Shuttle's at the bottom of the ramp, get moving while I cover your ass!"

Grunt lumbered forward, Garrus' booted toes bouncing against the decking with every stride, sending bolts of pain up his burned legs. From behind them, he could hear Shepard's Mattock hammering away and the chattering sound of Collector assault rifles returning fire. They'd only just finished off the husk blockade in time. Joker's voice crackled over the comm again and there was no mistaking the tension in his voice. Shepard dropped all pretense of an orderly retreat, sending Grunt barreling toward the shuttle with her hot on his heels.

When Garrus woke up, he found himself looking at the familiar face of Dr. Chakwas. His legs were elevated and throbbing dully courtesy of medi-gel and other painkillers she must have dosed him up with. An IV was hooked up to the crook of one elbow, dripping he knew not what into his bloodstream. The turian equivalent of saline, perhaps, to help overcome the fluid loss that was part and parcel of bad burn injuries.

"Welcome back, Garrus," she said, smiling. "Let's try to keep any future injuries as simple to treat as burns, shall we? Touch-and-go medicine doesn't have the thrill it used to."

His mandibles parted slightly and he chuckled. "I'll try to keep that in mind, doctor." He glanced down at his legs, which were elevated to keep the swelling down. His shins were swathed in bandages from knee to ankle, not including his spurs. "What's the damage this time?"

"Second and third degree burns. Plus your shinguards have been slagged to hell and gone."

Garrus' eyes flicked over to find Commander Shepard perched on the other bed in the medbay. One arm was in a sling. The other was holding up what was left of one of his armor's shin plates for evidence. He couldn't help but wince at the sight. "I should be glad I still have legs."

"I'm inclined to agree, Garrus," said Dr. Chakwas. "Do try not to run into any more directed energy weapons. I saw what they could do to the original _Normandy_; I don't need to see what they can do to living beings." With that final parting quip, the doctor made her way back to her desk, leaving the two of them as alone as could be hoped for in the confines of a frigate's medbay.

Shepard hopped off the bed and took the spot Chakwas had vacated. "If it makes you feel any better, the doctor gave me the same spiel." She gestured to her immobilized arm. "Particle beam rifles are bad for you; who'd have guessed, right?"

"I could have told you what the amped-up versions did if you'd just asked, rather than seeing what handheld versions could do firsthand," Garrus shot back, mandibles spread in a turian smirk.

That earned him a tired grin and a chuckle from Shepard. "You comfortable, Garrus?" she asked.

The turian offered her a shrug. "As comfortable as you can be with burned legs and an IV in your arm," he replied.

She smiled down at him, her good hand brushing the top of his fringe gently. It felt warm against the metal-laced plates. Soft, too. Garrus was a little surprised by the gesture, mandibles opening slightly at her touch. It was another human thing, he knew…but he'd only ever seen her place her hand on Kaidan's head to…what was the phrase? 'Tousle his hair?'

"Good," she replied, still smiling. "That old C-Sec suit won't cut it. Even Tali thinks those shinguards are only good for scrap now. Combine that with the damage to the cowl piece and…well…" She shrugged, then grimaced as the motion aggravated whatever wound had necessitated the sling. "We're en route to the Citadel to get you some new armor."

"When a quarian tells you to scrap something, that probably is a good sign it belongs on the junkpile," Garrus conceded. "Especially if that quarian is Tali," he added, sighing. "It's served me well since you…well. Since I left C-Sec. Hard to say goodbye."

Shepard patted the top of his fringe. "I understand," she replied. "Any soldier who claims to have never gotten attached to a piece of their gear is a filthy liar. Hopefully the replacement suit will live up to its predecessor's high performance standard."

"Here's hoping, Shepard," Garrus agreed. "I'm guessing I'm relieved of duty until Dr. Chakwas says otherwise?" he asked, gesturing down at his bandaged shins.

"Correct," replied Shepard. She raised her hand to forestall the protest forming on his tongue with a smirk. "And only EDI will have access to the main battery while you're laid up, so don't fret about your calibrations being ruined."

He chuckled, mollified. "All right, Shepard, all right."

"Oh, and that reminds me, I have something for you. A little light reading, for when you're not too busy sleeping or staring at the ceiling." Turning back to the bed she'd been seated on, Shepard procured a data pad and passed it over to him. "EDI handled the translation to turian standard, so I'm hoping this means there won't be any misunderstandings." He saw a spark of humor in her eyes as she passed it over to him. She brushed her hand over his fringe one more time, the gesture clearly meant to be affectionate. "I'm going to go turn in, myself. Dealing with the Illusive Man's bullshit is nearly as draining as the mission itself. Heal fast, Garrus."

"Thanks, Shepard. Sleep well," replied the turian as she departed. The top of his fringe was still slightly warm from where she'd touched him. It was not altogether unpleasant, but it was…odd. He'd been hurt several times during the hunt for Saren, though not this badly, and she'd never reacted like this before. Garrus turned his attention to the data pad she'd passed him.

_Officer Vakarian, Commander Shepard requested that I compile this document in your native language so as to minimize chances of misunderstanding on your part. I showed the original human standard version to Mr. Moreau; he believes this is intended as a joke._

_~EDI_

Garrus' mandibles drooped slightly in the turian equivalent of a frown, but given the expression he'd seen on the commander's face as she passed it along, it made sense that this was some sort of gag on her part. He thumbed the key to advance the page.

_Part I: How to Dodge_

The turian's laughter filled the medbay as he paged through the document.

* * *

Author's Note: Sorry about the spectacular delay in updating. Writer's block and Real Life have taken their toll of late. I hope the length kind of makes up for that. :)

So am I the only person who has trouble keeping our favorite turian conscious for the duration of the battle with the Praetorian on the 'disabled' Collector Vessel? :/ That was basically the inspiration for this chapter, combined with a desire to show the commander's changing view of her turian best friend.

I've tried to translate game mechanics/aesthetics (delay in shield recharge after getting hit by a Scion, why the hell all the weapons save sniper rifles have twin barrels when only one ever fires bullets, etc.) into something that makes sense for me. Hopefully my 'head canon' doesn't confuse too many. As for how/why Garrus and the others know what a Praetorian/Scion/Assassin/whatever is...uh... ...space magic...? n.n* Honestly, I couldn't figure out anything else to call these things that wouldn't be seen as a massive waste of words by anyone familiar with the game.

Since we are approaching (in game-time anyway) the official start of the romance chats between Garrus and Shepard, I feel I ought to issue the following warning: those of you who are hoping for graphic sexytimes between the two of them are going to be disappointed. I rated this "M" because the games are all rated "M" for liberal use of profanity, some really fucked-up violence, and the 'sex' scenes that are not at all explicit/graphic/whatever. I have zero experience writing smut and I have no desire to learn how to write it. If you are looking for graphic sexytimes, might I humbly suggest [url= s/7279093/1/]Sound the Clarion[/url] by Amber Penglass? FYI, it is an AU fic, but damn is it a good read! :)

As always, reviews and critiques are very much appreciated, and a thank-you to everyone who's reading and following this story. Glad people are liking it. :)


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